Captain Volkonogov Escaped, a film written and directed by Natasha Merkulova and Aleksey Chupov, received its premiere on 23 September as part of the main program at the 32nd Kinotavr Film Festival. Many would-be audience members unfortunately missed out, as tickets sold out almost as soon as booking opened.
Natasha Merkulova and Aleksey Chupov took to the stage alongside actors Yuriy Borisov, Natalya Kudryashova and Anastasiya Ukolova and lead producer Anna Tikhonova.
"Thank you so much for coming to see our film," said Natasha Merkulova.
"I wanted to say literally a few words about the magic of Kinotavr, because Aleksey Chupov and I were supposed to be on the night shift, and yet here we are on the night stage instead. So it's incredible that we managed to get here to introduce our film. The film is the work of a large group of talented people, first and foremost our director of photography Mart Taniel, production designer Sergey Fevralev and costume designer Nadezhda Vasilieva."
In his speech, Aleksey made mention of those actors who were sadly unable to join him on stage that evening: Timofey Tribuntsev, Aleksandr Yatsenko, Igor Savochkin, Maxim Stoyanov and many others.
"Then, of course," said Natasha Merkulova, "There are the people who this film owes its existence to: our fabulous producers, Valeriy Fedorovich, Evgeniy Nikishov and Aleksandr Plotnikov."
Yuriy Borisov, who had already introduced one film that day and was in a hurry to catch a plane, also made a short speech.
"I just wanted to say that this is the first time I've spent so long at Kinotavr. And it was probably a once-in-a-lifetime experience. I wanted to thank you all for that. Thank you so much. And now, enjoy the film. I have to run."
