Two Brothers, at War and in Peace

Two men. Two directors. Two paths.

One Oscar. One Emmy. One family.

Nikita Mikhalkov and Andrei Konchalovsky. Known to different audiences on different continents, the two Russian directors are brothers. Their names are synonymous with complex characters and beautiful cinematography. The story of their lives reads like a movie synopsis, with political aspirations, passionate romance and sibling rivalry.

In February, the 53-year-old Mikhalkov staged a spectacular premiere in the Kremlin for his latest film, “The Barber of Siberia.” Mikhalkov, who won a best foreign-language film Oscar for his 1994 movie “Burnt by the Sun,” drew Hollywood stars Julia Ormond, Robert Duvall and Shirley MacLaine to the gala affair. The $45-million “Barber” is the most expensive Russian movie to hit theaters since the 1967 film “War and Peace.”

The director, who favors the idea of a constitutional monarchy for Russia, cast himself in the film in the role of Czar Alexander III. Some said he was trying on the crown. While promoting the film, Mikhalkov said he would run for the Russian presidency next year “if the people insist.”

“The Barber” opened the Cannes Film Festival last month and was quickly panned by critics, including some who walked out after only an hour. One called the three-hour film “the longest political broadcast in history.”

Meanwhile, big brother Konchalovsky, 61, who won an Emmy for directing 1997’s NBC television miniseries “The Odyssey,” in February published “Lofty Deceptions,” a second volume of tell-all memoirs that has quickly become a bestseller in Russia.

A sequel to “Home Truths,” which was also a Russian bestseller, “Lofty Deceptions” expands on the tales of Konchalovsky’s life and loves in Hollywood. The book, so far published only in Russian, boasts of his affairs with MacLaine and Juliet Binoche. He writes about his early days in 1980s Hollywood and claims he sold smuggled black caviar to Barbra Streisand and Milos Forman. He tells of his dispute with Sylvester Stallone in the making of “Tango and Cash” and about directing “The Odyssey,” which at $44 million was the most expensive miniseries ever to appear on American TV screens.

While Konchalovsky has been a big spender in Hollywood, Mikhalkov is now facing criticism in Russia for following suit with the “The Barber of Siberia.”

Although the film is a Russian box-office hit, members of parliament have launched an inquiry into whether it was proper for the Russian government to spend $11 million on the film and its premiere. Mikhalkov says the government kicked in the money because the movie “would be good for Russian morale.”

Mikhalkov’s movie has tapped into Russian nostalgia and inspired hopes of a return to greatness. It also has managed--temporarily, at least--to unite the country’s political elite, from Communists to nationalists to pro-Western capitalists.

Among those attending the Kremlin premiere were then-Prime Minister Yevgeny M. Primakov, former Prime Minister Viktor S. Chernomyrdin, former Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev, Communist Party leader Gennady A. Zyuganov and pro-market Yabloko Party leader Grigory A. Yavlinsky.

“The Barber” depicts a beautiful and untouched pre-Communist Russia inhabited by a noble and honest people. Their peaceful existence is disrupted by the arrival of an eccentric American (Richard Harris) who creates the Barber, a horrendous machine designed to hack down Siberia’s virgin forests. Harris is accompanied by Jane (Ormond), a femme fatale who leads the innocent Russian hero Andrei Tolstoy (Oleg Menshikov of “Burnt by the Sun”) astray.

Eventually, the Americans are run out of town in a rejection of Western values.

The film seems to mirror Mikhalkov’s own support of all things Russian. “I love my country,” he said recently at a news conference. “Yes, we have a crisis, corruption, default, but we also have a great country that produces excellent caviar, vodka, chess players and ballerinas.”

The more Westernized Konchalovsky, in contrast, is scathing in his criticism of Russia’s political culture. “I hated the Communist Party. A Soviet passport was a slave’s passport. I was embarrassed to live in this country,” he writes in “Home Truths.”

His thoughts are equally pessimistic on what lies ahead for his native land. “Russia’s future lies in its past. It has an immense propensity for authoritarian systems,” he said in an interview. “They don’t know what democracy is yet, and every attempt to bring it here will be the same as America’s attempt to bring democracy to Mexico.”

This chasm between the brothers’ political views can be traced back to their star-studded yet turbulent family history.

They were born into a long line of Russian writers, painters and nobility that Mikhalkov says extends back to Catherine the Great and Leo Tolstoy.

Grandfather Pyotr Konchalovsky was an Impressionist painter who got away with refusing to paint Stalin’s portrait. Mother Natalia Konchalovskaya was a member of the aristocracy who opposed the Russian Revolution. Their father, Sergei Mikhalkov, embraced Communist ideals, penned the words to the Soviet national anthem and wrote a poem for Stalin’s daughter, Svetlana.

It was this hybrid of aristocratic and Communist roots that led the brothers along separate paths.

After taking his mother’s maiden name, a protest against his Communist father, Andrei Konchalovsky emigrated from the Soviet Union in 1968 by marrying a French woman.

Although Konchalovsky invited Mikhalkov to join him in the West, the younger brother refused to leave Russia.

“Nikita is a patriot, more Slavophile than me,” Konchalovsky once said. “I am more cosmopolitan and rational; he is more emotional, and that makes him impassioned and intolerant, as real Russians are.”

Evidently, there has been some friction between the siblings. “He was my little brother. I took him to film shoots,” Konchalovsky wrote. “But before I knew it, the boot was on the other foot and he was flying the family flag. I have to say that I quickly became jealous of him and his success.”

When they met at Cannes in 1988, their reunion was fraught with envy. “It is very difficult competing against a member of your own family,” Konchalovsky recalled.

Luckily for them, both left as winners. Mikhalkov’s Italian-language film “Dark Eyes” won a best actor award for Marcello Mastroianni. Konchalovsky’s “Shy People” won a best actress award for Barbara Hershey.

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The emigre Konchalovsky followed the traditional route to Hollywood, arriving in Los Angeles in the early ‘80s with very little money, but with friends in high places. He names Francis Ford Coppola as one who often helped him. By immersing himself in Hollywood, Konchalovsky turned out American tales with a touch of the Russian soul, such as “Runaway Train” (1985), starring Jon Voight, and “Homer and Eddie” (1989) with Whoopi Goldberg.

Mikhalkov, on the other hand, entered Hollywood by bludgeoning his distinctly Russian films into mainstream international cinema. While enjoying his success, he seems to take pride in never pandering to the West.

He also enjoys promoting himself at the expense of American stars. “During a reading for ‘The Barber,’ Andie MacDowell asked me if I was directing my first film,” he frequently tells reporters in Russia. “I explained to her calmly that I had just won an Oscar the year before.”

Since the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991, the brothers have found it easier to reconcile their differences. The emigre has even started to make peace with the country his brother loves so much.

“I appreciate Nikita’s love for Russia,” Konchalovsky writes. “If it weren’t for him, I would never have returned. I love Russia more because of him.”

They also agree on a few other things. “I don’t watch new films,” Konchalovsky said at a news conference to promote his book. “They’re all the same. All Tarantino does is make a cocktail of other films. In the old days you would end up in court for that.”

Mikhalkov agrees: “I find them to be like McDonald’s--fast, cheap and tasteless.”

As for the future, the siblings plan to continue on their separate but reconciled ways, taking in Hollywood and Russia along their paths.