Russian screenwriter Andrei Zolotarev said films about factory workers are far rarer in Russia today than they were in Soviet times, and that producers who tackle the subject need help from the state, according to comments he gave to the National News Service (NSN).
Zolotarev said it is not enough simply to make films about ordinary workers. He said such films need to be well made, with strong dramatic structure, if they are to reach a mass audience and draw attention to working professions.
A union leader's call for more worker films
The remarks followed comments from Sergei Chernogaev, chairman of the Federation of Independent Trade Unions of Russia, who said at a press conference at the state news agency TASS that Russia lacks films in which working people take center stage and their profession becomes part of their character and story. Chernogaev said such films should not turn into production reports or collections of slogans.
Zolotarev agreed that the idea of making films about factory workers is a good one, but said it needs to be carried out skillfully.
Police, doctors and soldiers dominate
Zolotarev said the professions that most attract screenwriters are police officers, doctors and soldiers, and that there are many films about them. Films about factory workers, by contrast, are now far fewer than in the Soviet Union, which had its own genre known as the production drama. He said those films typically followed a person who did not want to work, then came to want to, and went on to labor for the good of the collective.
He said the message behind that kind of story is sound, but that it is dramatically difficult to pull off, because audiences tend to connect with personal problems. Empathy, he said, is usually triggered by a character who has been treated unjustly or who is trying to right a wrong, and it is hard to generate that feeling when the injustice is that a factory failed to machine enough parts. He said the skill of a good dramatist lies in telling that kind of story so it still feels compelling and enjoyable.
Quality over quantity, Zolotarev says
Zolotarev said it matters more to make such films well than to make many of them, and pointed to sports dramas as a model to follow. He said good films stimulate interest in working professions while bad ones put audiences off, and that making a large number of poor films about factory work would actually make things worse rather than better.
As an example, he cited the film known in Russian as "The Man Who Changed Everything," a title referring to Moneyball, the drama about how statistical analysis transformed baseball. He said that on paper it sounds like a dull film about numbers winning a baseball season, but that the way it was made showcases real craftsmanship and makes it impossible to look away. He said Russia needs films built on that same principle, where the setting, whether a factory or any other workplace, matters less than finding an approach that makes the people in it genuinely interesting to watch.
Why doctors get more screen time than miners
Zolotarev said the amount of screen time a profession gets often depends on how deeply a screenwriter can immerse themselves in it. He said films about doctors are made more often because audiences encounter medicine constantly, since everyone gets sick and everyone will at some point face questions of life and death, which naturally draws strong interest. But he said far fewer screenwriters have gone down a mine, for instance, so fewer are equipped to make that world interesting without real immersion in the subject.
Zolotarev calls for state subsidies
Zolotarev said that for change to happen, the country needs to consider a subsidy mechanism to support producers who focus on stories about working professions. He said support does not have to mean tax breaks alone, and could include help with filming locations, such as simply granting access to shoot inside a factory. He said that if the goal is a noticeable result in the near term, it is worth considering how to help these producers and steer their attention toward the subject.
The National News Service noted that director and producer Sergei Chliyants had earlier told the outlet that Russia faces a shortage of good screenwriters, which he linked to a decline in film schools, an influx of self-styled producers, and a drop in the prestige of the screenwriting profession.
