Sundance review: 'Navalny' is a tense spy thriller wrapped in a compelling political drama wrapped in a smart documentary
A spy thriller in real life, unfolding right in front of the cameras, director Daniel Roher’s “Navalny” is one of those movies that had to be a documentary — because no screenwriter would dare turn in something so on the nose.
The movie starts near the end of the story, on Jan. 17, 2021, when Alexei Navalny — leader of the Russian opposition, anti-corruption activist and thorn in Vladimir Putin’s backside — is getting ready to leave Germany and return to Russia. Navalny knows he’ll be arrested when he gets there, on trumped-up charges meant to silence him. It’s no spoiler to say that’s exactly what happened.
Roher then goes back to what Navalny was doing to attract such hardline behavior from Putin’s government. The video footage shows Navalny leading protest rallies, whipping up support from thousands of Russians for his campaign to root out the corrupt leadership of Putin’s kleptocracy. Putin’s government breaks up protests, bans him from TV and won’t let his image appear in newspapers. He maintains his following through social media, with a video blog with millions of followers.
In a later interview with Roher, Navalny says he may have assumed he would be safe because he was so well known. “If I’m famous, It will be problematic for them just to kill me,” Navalny tells Roher, adding, “I was very wrong.”
On Aug. 22, 2020, Navalny was flying from Tomsk, in Siberia, back to Moscow when he started crying out in pain. The plane landed in Omsk, and he was rushed to a hospital. After delays that Navalny’s team said were suspicious, and after being called out by European leaders, Navalny was flown to Germany for treatment. Doctors there said Navalny had been poisoned, by a nerve agent called Novichok — a signature concoction used on Putin’s enemies.
Meanwhile, in Vienna, a Bulgarian data nerd, Christo Grozev, enters the narrative. Grozev runs Bellingcat, a data-driven investigative journalism outlet, and he dug into Russian plane manifests and phone records (some bought off the black market) and seemed to have found the men who poisoned Navalny — and proof that they were linked to Putin’s government.
That investigation, and the fallout from it, is at the heart of Roher’s movie. It all sounds so outlandish, and sometimes so ridiculous — there’s even a bulletin board with red yarn, like in a conspiracy thriller — that you have to remind yourself that it’s all happening. (It’s also a reminder that Navalny is very aware of his image, as anyone with millions of social-media followers must be.)
Roher doesn’t put Navalny up as a plaster saint. There are some rough edges to this freedom-fighter persona — like the fact that he shared the podium with Russian white-supremacist groups early in his career. “It’s my political superpower,” he tells Roher, “I can talk to anyone.”
Even with a foregone conclusion, Roher’s movie has the feel of a gripping political thriller. Credit the drum-tight editing by Langdon Page and Maya Daisy Hawke, and the intriguing cast of characters that includes Navalny’s team and his iron-willed wife, Yulia.
Of course, the problem with “Navalny” is that we don’t know the ending. Alexei Navalny is locked away in a Russian prison, while the man who (allegedly) ordered him killed is leading a large nation and has access to nuclear missiles. If that doesn’t make you scared and angry, maybe this riveting documentary will.
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‘Navalny’
★★★1/2
Premiered Tuesday, January 25, in the U.S. Documentary competition at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival. Screens again on the festival portal, Thursday, January 27, for a 24-hour window starting at 8 a.m. Not rated, but probably PG-13 for language, footage of police violence, and descriptions of poisoning. Running time: 98 minutes; in English, and in Russian with subtitles.