Hymn Of The Plague

A boy plays with a ball in a corridor as musicians we can’t see tune up on the other side of the wall. The ball bounces as the child recites what sounds like an old rhyme. The story, which taunts the plague of this atmospheric film's title, is based on Pushkin’s Alexander Pushkin’s play A Feast In Time Of Plague.

Small children reciting old rhymes is surely one of the oldest tricks in the book for generating atmosphere but Ataka51 employ it with the smoothness of a tried and tested magician. This Paris-based collective of Russian filmmakers use the empty corridor and DoP Sergei Medvedev’s drifting camera to create tension, before a smartly employed special effect ripples the world as we know it. There’s more than a touch of Stephen King about this story but the way music stands and a piano will contort also recalls older gothic horror. “Don’t be naughty,” the child is told - but in this world of unseen threat, sitting quietly and behaving yourself in the eyes of authority is no guarantee of protection.

When the musicians take a break, they’ve noticed something isn’t quite right, but idly explain it away. As they return to their rehearsal, they too are singing about the plague, turning a blind eye to things that are happening. You don’t need a degree in metaphor of the modern world to see the irony in those ignoring distortions of reality even as they are singing about an invisible threat.

This is a cinematic exercise that deftly combines the musical craft of rock musician Leonid Fedorov and composer Vladimir Martynov (working with the Opus Posth ensemble) with effective special effects work. The winner of Locarno’s Pardino d’Argento, Hymn Of The Plague is unsettling in a way that resonates beyond what we’re directly told - the sort of tale that creeps into your head and lets you do the rest of the work.