The film "Sun" by well-known Russian film director Alexander Sokurov has been invited to take part in the competition of the 55th Berlin film festival.

The film director and producers received an official invitation on behalf of festival president Dietrich Kosslick which says that the film had produced a deep impression on the selection commission of the festival, Inna Karpushina, the press-secretary of the St. Petersburg-based film studio "Nikola-film"- producer of the film, reported.

In her words, "The Sun" is the first in the past five years Russian film awarded the honor to be represented in the competition of the Berlin film festival. The last time, in 2000 the film "Russian Rebellion" by Alexander Proshkin was shown there.

The Berlin film festival will run from February 10 to February 20. In Russia, the work of the famous film director will be released on February 17. "So, the Russian movie-goers will see the film simultaneously with the jury of the Berlin film festival," Karpushina noted.

The film "Sun", devoted to Japanese Emperor Hirohito, has become the third film of the tetralogy telling about the great historical personalities of the past century, Alexander Sokurov told us earlier. "The first film - 'Moloch' - was devoted to Hitler, a European, the second - 'Taurus' - to Lenin, a representative of Eurasia," Sokurov recalled.

The events of the film take place in the distant year 1945 when US troops entered the territory of the Country of the Rising Sun. The heroes of the film are Emperor Hirohito and general MacArthur, commander of US troops, who, in the film director's opinion, managed to find a way out of the deadlock.

"Political honor means nothing when the point at issue is human lives - this was the way taken by Emperor Hirohito. This is an example of clever force. Not a single politician, either before or after him, could find a humanitarian way out of a critical situation," he said.

US actor Robert Dawson plays the role of the US general, while Japanese actors - those of Emperor Hirohito and his entourage.

"In my film I wanted to show integral characters ands this can be done only with the help of actors-bearers of this culture," he said.

The film costs $2.5 million, with Russian culture ministry subsidies making up 45% of them. This is the largest budget of a film in the "art-house" genre in the history of cinematography in Russia.

News source: www.en.rian.ru
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