''Tchaikovsky's Wife'' () is a 2022 Russian biographical drama film written and directed by

Kirill Serebrennikov Kirill Semyonovich Serebrennikov (; born 7 September 1969) is a Russian stage and film director and theatre designer. Since 2012, he has been the artistic director of the Gogol Center in Moscow. He is one of Russia's leading theatre and cinem ...

. It was selected to compete for the

Palme d'Or The (; ) is the highest prize awarded to the director of the Best Feature Film of the Official Competition at the Cannes Film Festival. It was introduced in 1955 by the festival's organizing committee. Previously, from 1939 to 1954, the festiv ...

at the

2022 Cannes Film Festival The 75th annual Cannes Film Festival is a film festival that took place from 17 to 28 May 2022. French actor Vincent Lindon served as jury president for the main competition. French actress Virginie Efira hosted the opening and closing ceremon ...

Premise

Set in the

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire that spanned most of northern Eurasia from its establishment in November 1721 until the proclamation of the Russian Republic in September 1917. At its height in the late 19th century, it covered about , roughl ...

during the second half of the 19th century, the film is about the wife of the composer

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky ( ; 7 May 1840 – 6 November 1893) was a Russian composer during the Romantic period. He was the first Russian composer whose music made a lasting impression internationally. Tchaikovsky wrote some of the most popula ...

. She cannot accept her husband's homosexuality and as a result, gradually loses her mind.

Cast

* Alyona Mikhaylova as

Antonina Miliukova Antonina Ivanovna Miliukova (; – ) was the wife of Russian composer Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky from 1877 until his death in 1893. After marriage she was known as Antonina Tchaikovskaya. Early years Little is known of Antonina before she me ...

, Tchaikovsky's wife * Odin Biron as

* Yuliya Aug as a crazy old woman * Miron Fyodorov as

Nikolai Rubinstein Nikolai Grigoryevich Rubinstein (; – ) was a Russian pianist, conductor, and composer. He was the younger brother of Anton Rubinstein and a close friend of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. Life Born to Jewish parents in Moscow, where his father ...

* Alexander Gorchilin as

Anatoliy Brandukov Anatoly Andreyevich Brandukov ( – February 16, 1930) was a Russian cellist who premiered many cello pieces of prominent composers including Pyotr Tchaikovsky and Sergei Rachmaninoff. Born as Russian classical music was flourishing in the middle ...

Filipp Avdeyev Filipp Vadimovich Avdeyev (; born November 10, 1991) is a Russian actor and director. A graduate of the Moscow Art Theatre School. Since 2012 he has been an actor at the Gogol Center Theater. Biography Filipp Avdeyev was born on November 10, 199 ...

as a

Modest Ilyich Tchaikovsky Modest Ilyich Tchaikovsky (; –) was a Russian people, Russian dramatist, opera librettist and translator. Early life Modest Ilyich was born in Alapayevsk, Verkhotursky Uyezd, Perm Governorate, the younger brother of the composer Pyotr Ilyich ...

and Anatoly Ilyich Tchaikovsky * Varvara Shmykova as Alexandra, Tchaikovsky's sister * Vladimir Mishukov as Shlykov, Antonina's attorney * Andrey Burkovsky as Prince Vladimir Meshchersky * Ekaterina Ermishina as Liza, Antonina's sister * Viktor Khorinyak as Peter Jurgenson

Release

The film was presented at the 75th Cannes Film Festival's main competition on May 18, 2022 (Day 2). In the context of the ongoing

Russian invasion of Ukraine On 24 February 2022, , starting the largest and deadliest war in Europe since World War II, in a major escalation of the Russo-Ukrainian War, conflict between the two countries which began in 2014. The fighting has caused hundreds of thou ...

, European Film Academy president

Agnieszka Holland Agnieszka Holland (; born 28 November 1948) is a Polish film and television director and screenwriter, best known for her cultural and political contributions to Polish cinema. She began her career as an assistant to directors Krzysztof Zanuss ...

criticised the decision to screen a Russian film at the Cannes' main competition, noting that Kirill Serebrennikov "used he film's festival press conferenceto praise a Russian oligarch and compare the tragedy of Russian soldiers to Ukrainian defenders. I would not give him such a chance at this very moment", even though Serebrennikov openly condemns the war and for this all his productions in his home country were cancelled.

Reception

Film critic Zinaida Pronchenko negatively assessed the film: "One continuous ridiculous metaphor of the Russian world". On a contrary, Peter Bradshaw from ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...

'' praised the film as far superior to Serebrennikov's previous '' Petrov's Flu'', and described Alyona Mikhailova's performance as tremendous. ''Tchaikovsky's Wife'' has an approval rating of 85% on

review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews and ratings of products and services, such as films, books, video games, music, software, hardware, or cars. This system then stores the reviews to be used for supporting a website where user ...

website

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review aggregator, review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee ...

, based on 33 reviews, and an average rating of 6.6/10. The website's critical consensus states: "If at times opaquely and certainly prolongedly, '' Tchaikovski's Wife'' elegantly captures a heartbroken woman's obsession with her prominent spouse who struggled with his own censured sexuality".

Metacritic Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...

assigned the film a weighted average score of 50 out of 100, based on 10 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".Tchaikovsky's Wife
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References

External links