Images of buffoons and fools in Russian cinema

Abstract

Directors of Russian cinema of the Soviet and post-Soviet periods portray jesters and fools in the development of the theme of historical formation of pre-Petrine Russia. As participants of social communication with an atypical code of visual and verbal expression, jesters, skomorokhs and fools encrypt socio-cultural codes of historical memory, which can acquire additional productivity due to the nature of the screen medium. The fools in the films of S. Eisenstein, A. Tarkovsky, and P. Lungin are depicted as denouncers of vices through direct (pleas, monologues, prayers) and indirect (public gestures) appeals to people: parodies, provocative skits, spontaneous performances and quotations. The visual techniques of screen arts are coupled with all those forms of denunciation. The unity of the line of depicting jesters and fools by Russian directors becomes evident in the technique of “theater in the theater”, “mask of masks”, when social masks put on masks in order to expose a significant character. The article shows the performative nature of screen arts and the ways for enhancing the performativity by the portrayal of social outsiders.