This film was like launching a huge aircraft carrier. When I started preparing, the Soviet Union still existed. Then, over a long period I served as a kind of bait or propaganda for perestroika - I was taken straight out of mothballs where I had been kept for a long time (having been fired), suddenly turned into a popular artist and was sent all over the world to recount the unbelievable process of democratization that was occuring in Russia. Which I did sincerely. It matched my somewhat anarchic temperament, and I was completely euphoric about what was happening in my country. But I wasted too much time on that. This is what I now face: just as it was impossible for me to work under the Bolsheviks, it is almost equally impossible to work today. Before, movies were smothered ideologically, now they're destroyed economically. I'm happy to have worked with French producers on "Khrustaliov", because it gave me freedom. My principle has always been to reject the demands of others, whether of the old regime or today's regime. that explains my unfortunate fate in the movies. Unfornunate or maybe fortunate, I'm not sure.

(Alexeï Guerman - Director)