REVIEW: ‘Citizen K’
Photo: Mikhail Khodorkovsky, at one point one of the wealthiest people in the world, is the subject of Alex Gibney’s new documentary, Citizen K. Photo courtesy of Greenwich Entertainment / Provided by Film Forum press site with permission.
Alex Gibney’s new documentary, Citizen K, looks at the state of Russian politics and economics over the past 30 years. His focal point for this two-hour exploration is former oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky, whose complicated story serves as a symbolic reminder of Russia’s strange turn of fate since the days of the USSR.
For those unaware of Khodorkovsky’s story, the details of Gibney’s film will be quite shocking. The oil man, who was one of the controversial and powerful oligarchs that emerged in the new democratic society under President Boris Yeltsin, amassed a great deal of power and influence in modern Russia. However, he eventually ran afoul of current President Vladimir Putin. Allegations were made about tax evasion and a still-unclear death of a local mayor near Khodorkovsky’s oil fields, and this led to the oligarch finding himself on trial — in quite a public way.
Found guilty and sentenced to hard time in Siberia, Khodorkovsky was only released after Russia made a good-faith effort to release political opponents in the lead up to the Sochi Olympics. Now the man who used to frequent the highest-caliber circles of Russian society finds himself living a quieter life in London, trying his best to influence his former country from afar.
The story of Khodorkovsky is admittedly a difficult one to follow, with many nuances, developments and facets that don’t easily fit into a box. This is not the land of black and white; grey can be found everywhere within this narrative fabric.
Gibney is not interested in letting anyone off the hook. Instead, he is after full immersion, a quest to understand how power and business seem to be behind Russia’s every step (and seemingly every step of other superpowers). Khodorkovsky is a unique example, but still a symbolic one, a tale that is equal parts intriguing, damning, saddening and frightening.
More than anything else, Citizen K, which is currently playing an extended engagement at New York City’s Film Forum, is a slice-of-life portrait of what it’s like to live and succeed in Russia — whether or not one plays by the rules. Although the title refers to this former oligarch, it could easily be retitled with a Putin namesake. Whether they like this reality or not, the two are inextricably connected, one clearly with the upper hand and the other on the run.
This is not the first documentary about Khodorkovsky. Almost a decade ago, the Film Forum also screened Cyril Tuschi’s portrait of the oligarch. Both films are fascinating, and taken together they provide audience members the rare chance to see a “before” portrait and an “after” portrait of a complicated figure. Certainly Khodorkovsky’s fate in Gibney’s updated story seems to be more positive than the pure bleakness of the 2011 documentary, but permeating both cinematic narratives is an uneasiness, an unsettled nature, a stark reality of the broken promises of Russia. In both movies, the losers of the high-stakes political system seem to be the people far down the economic ladder from the upper-echelons of presidents and oligarchs.
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
Citizen K (2019), featuring Mikhail Khodorkovsky, is currently playing New York City’s Film Forum. Written and directed by Alex Gibney. Running time: 126 minutes. In English and Russian with English subtitles. Rating: 
