Russian auteur Alexander Sokurov has had an uneasy relationship with power and the various organs which enforce it, even being summoned for an interrogation by the KGB at a point in his career. It has also fascinated him, as evident from his explorations of the personal lives of three powerful historical figures in the Men of Power trilogy.
When Sokurov landed in the city to receive the Lifetime Achievement Award as part of the 22nd International Film Festival of Kerala, one of the first wishes he expressed to the organisers was to visit a police station, to study how differently the police force here worked, compared to his home country.
On Tuesday afternoon, the Kerala State Chalachitra Academy officials fulfilled his wish. Sokurov, along with his personal assistant and interpreter, visited the Fort Janamithri police station, which is one of the ‘child-friendly’ stations in the city.
“One of the major things he was interested in was the type of crimes here. He talked about how Russian cities have organised crime networks and frequent instances of gang warfare. He was surprised that there is no gun culture here. He was also interested in the time the police took to solve a crime and the methods adopted, and whether the parties involved attempted to arrive at a compromise. He sought to know whether women were involved in criminal activity in large numbers,” said Fort Assistant Commissioner J.K. Dinil.
The filmmaker spent more than an hour at the station, walking around and interacting with the police personnel. He asked them about their appointment process, qualifications required, the hierarchies in the department, welfare measures initiated by the department, on the Student Police Cadet programme and even the kind of vehicles used to chase criminals. He did not have a high opinion of the police force back home though.
