Two Soviet intellectuals, one affair, zero contact for 50 years. The pettiest beef in literary history.
A two-part documentary about the fraught relationship between Russian writer Viktor Shklovsky and émigré linguist Roman Jakobson.
Editing
Letters read aloud like dramatic confessionals.
Acting
Yursky and Kalyagin's voices carry decades of wounded pride.
Production
Stalin-era footage that somehow survived the censors.
Director
Vladimir Nepevny
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Shklovsky and Jakobson invented Russian Formalism together in 1915, then spent five decades not speaking. The movement outlasted their friendship.
Elsa Triolet—the woman between them—later married Louis Aragon and became the first woman to win the Prix Goncourt. Jakobson really knew how to pick 'em.
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