Two Prosecutors

Historical hindsight lets us predict where this kind of train ride inevitably ends.

What distinguishes Two Prosecutors is not its overall narrative trajectory (which reads more like a bitter cosmic joke than anything else) but rather how Loznitsa subtly colors in Kornyev’s journey through the halls of power.

This story of civic injustice isn’t just a great achievement by the director. It’s a cautionary tale about the repetition of tragic moments in history.

Two Prosecutors does not offer the audience easy answers or an emotional release; this restraint is exactly what gives it power. It’s a heavy film, one that is important and deserves to be seen.

It would be a mistake to seek too many lessons from the film. Its great achievement is in the creation of a timeless nowhere that is both drawn from history and independent of it. That is the absurdist ideal.

Loznitsa and his creative team have been meticulous in how every shot plays out. And as hinted earlier, the entire motion picture is meticulous to a fault. It’s only a somewhat twisty ending that saves the endeavor from blowing its relevance away.

His legal ambitions are thus stymied at every turn by missed appointments and disinterested power players, resulting in glacial narrative pacing and a miserably predictable outcome. It is, at best, vaguely Kafka-esque but also, for the viewer, quite the trial.