The Neoimperial Motif in Russian Historical Movies of the 2000s-2010s and the Phenomenon of Orthodox Cinematographic Sermon
Authors:   Institute of Developmental Biology of Russian Academy of Sciences, Sharov Konstantin S. 
Published: February 2023

During the last two decades, the topic of imperial consciousness and the ideological construction of a neo-imperial approach to contemporary Russian history within the narrative of post-Soviet “neo-imperialism” has been increasingly revived in Russian cinema. It has not much about developing the idea of Great Russia with a highest world mission. There are hardly more Slavophile motives here than Westernisers’ ones. The new historical movies shot mainly by the Russian state or Church request construct a parable about a great supranational historical empire, which unites all ethnic groups, peoples, and religions under the rule of the Russian Tsar / Emperor / Patriarch. For Soviet times, the Communist Party or its leader usually plays the role of the monarch, while the role of civil religion can be played by political ideology. The modern Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church disseminates the idea of imperialism as a basis of the Orthodox media cinematographic preaching. This type of preaching, along with Christian preaching on the Internet, social networks, and video games, has become increasingly used by Orthodox clergymen and church organisations. Here Russian Orthodox Church follows the Roman Catholics and Protestants, who currently use media sermon as an important part of their homiletics. From priests to clergy of the highest rank, such as Metropolitan Hilarion (Alfeev) of Volokolamsk or Metropolitan Tikhon (Shevkunov) of Pskov and Porkhovsk, more and more men of cloth begin to attract audience by their performance in offline and online video blogs, by online streams of their sermons in the digital space and finally, by shooting films, both documentaries and feature films. The main components of the neo-imperial narrative in the modern ideologised cinematographic preaching are the following: 1) constructing the parable of the great supranational historical empire (pre-Mongol Rus, Horde, Russian Principality, Russian Tsardom, Russian Empire, finally, the Soviet Union); 2) emphasising the great role of political leader, prince / tsar / emperor / general secretary / president; 3) resorting to preposterous synthesis of incompatible ideals of the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union; 4) spreading anti-historicism, anachronism, including linguistic, substituting historical fantasy for the history of the Russian Orthodox Church; 5) elevating the current national ideology to the status of national archetype, with searching and successful finding of “eternal” geopolitical enemies and friends of Russia; 6) re-considering Orthodoxy as a glamour “export product” for the West. The Cinematographic Orthodoxy depicted in imperial propaganda films has little in common with the history of the Russian Orthodox Church and the ideal of Orthodox Christian morality. Under the pen of scriptwriters and film directors who create their mass products by the order of the current Russian state or Patriarchate, Orthodox Christianity becomes a social and media construct that must exists solely for the blessing and support of the state power, as well as for the entertainment of the mass audience. Therefore, we must stress that such a preaching does not achieve its goals, as it does not preach Jesus Christ’s teaching, spirituality and a way for soul salvation and improvement.