The Sentimental Policeman / Chutlyvyi militsioner

The absurdist comedy tells the story of the emancipation of an ordinary policeman who discovers a child in a cabbage patch and decides to adopt it. This adventure helps the hero free himself from imposed gender stereotypes, transforming him from a strict representative of the authorities into a sensitive and dreamy post-Soviet commoner with parental aspirations. Following The Asthenic Syndrome, this light, ironic comedy appears as its complete antithesis, negating the harsh reality depicted in it The Asthenic Syndrome. The Sentimental Policeman, despite the director’s request to take the title and the film itself literally, is only stylized as socialist realism or, perhaps, a folk tale. In the film, Muratova employs methods similar to social art to redefine the stereotypical Soviet image of a representative of a state repressive machine, by giving him highly humanistic traits. She explores the lines between the social side and the biological side within an individual and how a person is infantilized in a totalitarian society.

Muratova herself described the film this way: ‘It was shot after the film The Asthenic Syndrome, which made me feel like everything had already been done and there was nothing left to record. I realized that I needed to delve into a dream, a fairy tale, something soft, gentle, and sentimental, the complete opposite! In general, this tendency to move in different directions characterizes me. And so, this film came into being, inspired by a half-page newspaper essay.’

The Sentimental Policeman marked Kira Muratova’s first post-Soviet film, co-produced with French colleagues. Therefore, for a long time a copy of the film was stored in France, only returning to Ukraine in 2019, thanks to the efforts of the Dovzhenko Center.

Muratova herself described the film this way: ‘It was shot after the film The Asthenic Syndrome, which made me feel like everything had already been done and there was nothing left to record. I realized that I needed to delve into a dream, a fairy tale, something soft, gentle, and sentimental, the complete opposite! In general, this tendency to move in different directions characterizes me. And so, this film came into being, inspired by a half-page newspaper essay.’

The Sentimental Policeman marked Kira Muratova’s first post-Soviet film, co-produced with French colleagues. Therefore, for a long time a copy of the film was stored in France, only returning to Ukraine in 2019, thanks to the efforts of the Dovzhenko Center.