Brigade. Once Upon a Time in Russia... The Story of the Creation of the Cult Series

ON THE ANNIVERSARY OF THE RELEASE OF THE CULT SERIES ABOUT TRUE FRIENDSHIP IN A DIFFICULT TIME! No matter how many times we rewatch "Brigade," the series reveals itself to us from a new perspective each time. As a lyrical... story of several guys who, having taken a wrong turn once, decided not to stop and to push to the limit. As a sensitive melodramatic saga about complex and fragile relationships born from the attraction of opposites. As a reconstructed chronicle, capturing not only significant dates and resonant events but also the range of public sentiments. That "Brigade" to which we return is a careful and sensitive portrait of a completely different Moscow, left in the foggy, autumn childhood of an entire generation. It is a somewhat phantom, phantasmagorical city at the intersection of documentary truth and fiction. If "Brigade" was a snapshot of its time, then this book is an attempt to look at the nineties and the early 2000s from a great distance and to understand something not only about the characters of the series but also about ourselves. Why do we remember the series as a beautiful saga of love and friendship, rather than a sad story about a lost generation and a difficult period in the country? Why does the series remain popular among the younger generation after so many years? And what was "Brigade" supposed to be really about? You will find all the answers in this book! Inside, you will find exclusive interviews with the actors and the film crew of the series and photographs from the personal archives of the producers, which will tell how the story of four friends, which became a cult classic, was actually created. "It is nice to realize that people saw not a crime story in this crime drama, but a story about people who, by the will of fate, found themselves in circumstances that determined the end of their lives. It is touching for us, artists, that the audience has a big heart to love those whom, it would seem, one cannot love." — Vladimir Vdovichenkov