The Presidential Library hosted a pre-premiere screening of the film "The Last Knight of the Empire", which was presented by its director Sergei Debizhev. The film tells about Ivan Solonevich, philosopher and essayist, a prominent representative of the monarchist wing of Russian emigration.
- We have made a large film important in today's geopolitical environment about how one should really love the motherland, said director Sergei Debizhev anticipating the show. The film is about a man who was rejected by it but who continues to serve the Fatherland with his talented pen and the ongoing quest for the "Russian way." During the shooting, reading books and diaries of Solonevich I realized a lot of things.
Hero's life included a full course of the Faculty of Law, University of Petrograd, service in the White Army, journalism, Sambo champion achievements realized in coaching. In the early 1930-ies, Solonevich together with other repressed was sent to construct the White Sea-Baltic Canal. In 1934, having lulled the vigilance of the guards, he fled to Finland. Later Solonevich settled in Sofia, where he came into contact with monarchist circles of emigration, published the "Voice of Russia" paper. Before the World War II he moved to Germany. The outbreak of war forced him to go to Argentina. In the Buenos Aires he published "Our country" paper, was engaged in historical and journalistic activities. Has lived and worked in Paris. Furious temperament of the publicist often met misunderstanding and magnanimity of highborn white emigrants incapable of action.
Biography of the hero of the film, as we see, is saturated. However, just a few photos that depict his life have survived along with a few minutes of old filming that captured Ivan Solonevich "alive". It was not easy for the film director to make visual series, but he coped with this problem, focusing not on Solonevich’s biography but on the biography of his ideas on the background of the main ideologies and realities of post-revolutionary Russia. His ideal of an enlightened, effective and fair ruler was Pyotr Stolypin. The conclusion to which I. Solonevich comes at the end of his book, "The People's monarchy", is also reflected in the final of the film: "No measurements, recipes, programs and ideology borrowed from outside, do not apply to the Russian statehood and Russian culture."