Zapugannii burzhui

Summary

A caustic, satirical dissection of class anxiety amidst the tectonic shifts of the Russian Revolution, Zapugannii burzhui (The Frightened Bourgeois) serves as a visceral caricature of the displaced elite. The narrative functions as a socio-political lampoon, excavating the psychological wreckage of a man—portrayed with frantic, jittery energy by Vladimir Gradov—who finds himself an anachronism in a world suddenly governed by the proletariat. Alongside the formidable Lidiya Tridenskaya, the film navigates the claustrophobic interiors of a lifestyle under siege, where every knock at the door resonates as an eschatological threat. Writers Lev Nikulin and Yakov Yadov eschew subtle nuance for a razor-sharp agitprop aesthetic, transforming the domestic sphere into a theater of the absurd. The film operates as a cinematic exorcism, purging the remnants of the old world through a sequence of increasingly grotesque and panicked vignettes that highlight the obsolescence of the titular character's values and his paralyzing terror of the burgeoning Soviet dawn.

Synopsis