Movie Review: 'Act & Punishment'

I will admit, I didn’t pay close enough attention to what Pussy Riot was really about. In my very Midwestern American way, I passively dismissed Pussy Riot simply because the name made me a little uncomfortable. I certainly could not talk about Pussy Riot on the radio on my talk show so I simply ignored the phenomenon. Now, I wish I hadn’t been so stupid. The new documentary Act & Punishment lays out the case that Pussy Riot is far more important than I had, in my limited worldview, ever imagined.

In 2011, a group of artists began to resist the rule of Vladimir Putin. Under Putin, Russia was beginning to revert to the era of dictatorships with Putin becoming so unquestioned as leader that he was able to name the people who would lead after him. Putin was gathering power around him and this included exerting influence over Russia’s most powerful religious leaders.

In the shadows a group of artists were beginning a small but notable rebellion. Specifically, three women decided that the best way to demonstrate against Putin was in the form of disruptive public performances. They chose the medium of punk rock because they weren’t trained musicians and yet they performed songs. They took their protests to the subways, public squares and prisons and performed songs such as “Mother of God, Drive Putin Away.”

The protests always ended the same with police dragging the women off to jail for several hours until they were released. This changed however when in 2013, Pussy Riot decided to perform inside the Moscow Cathedral. The protest was a disaster from the first moment. Someone had tipped off police that Pussy Riot would be attempting a guerrilla performance at the Cathedral and before they could even set up their instruments, police descended.

Even the women of Pussy Riot believed that the performance wasn’t anything worth talking about; they destroyed their own copies of the protest. However, others filmed the protest and from there Russian authorities, at the behest of church leaders, sought to have the women arrested and prosecuted. Fake videos emerged of a performance that never actually took place and the women were charged with Hooliganism, a charge that carried an at least two year prison sentence.

Act & Punishment captures all of this but the film is not merely a straight retelling of what happened to Pussy Riot. Director Evgeny Mitta and his team, rather than telling just the story of punk protest, take us inside the history of both political protest and Russian art and the notion is quite novel and fascinating. Act & Punishment lends an incredible historic context to what Pussy Riot did that elevates their work from mere acts of political protest to something genuinely traditional and important.

In Russia, there is a concept that I am sure other cultures may be familiar with but carries a more specific importance. It’s the concept of the Holy Fool. The Holy Fool is one who always speaks truth to power regardless of the consequence. The Holy Fool is celebrated in Russian history, especially among the artists who documented their story. The film tells many stories of the Holy Fool who acted against his own best interest and safety in order to oppose whomever claimed power in Russia.

One such Holy Fool was a man who instead of bringing bread and salt, traditional gifts, to Alexander the Great, instead brought raw meat. When Alexander angrily told the man of his offensive gift, stating that he did not eat meat, the man replied that the red meat was symbolic of Alexander the Great eating the flesh of his people. The man was killed for his insolence but artists celebrated him in poetry and painting because in historic context, it was a divine thing to speak truth to power.

That is what is so striking about Act & Punishment; it gives historic context to Pussy Riot. If you’re like me and you heard the name Pussy Riot and pushed it away because the name seemed juvenile and provocative, Act & Punishment points the way for you to see how wrong you are. The Holy Fools of Pussy Riot placed their safety and freedom in peril so that they could speak truth to power at a time when in Russia doing so can be downright deadly.

If there is one thing lacking in Act & Punishment it is the LGBTQ aspect that was so important to Pussy Riot. Defending homosexuals from persecution is a huge part of what Pussy Riot was about and yet, if you watch Act & Punishment, you would hardly know that it was important to them at all. That is a significant flaw but not one that leads me to say don’t see Act & Punishment.

Giving historic, political, religious and artistic context to Pussy Riot and helping educate people on the importance of what Pussy Riot did makes Act & Punishment an important film. It’s far from flawless, but Act & Punishment proves especially valuable for anyone who might not understand or deeply underestimated just how vital and important Pussy Riot was and remains in Russian history.

Act & Punishment opens in limited release on Friday, January 19.