The Wizard of the Kremlin

“Power was the plan. Putin was the consequence.”

Nobody can say quite how Vadim Baranov (Paul Dano), a man with a talent for shaping what people believe, ended up beside the rising KGB officer Vladimir Putin (Jude Law). The two meet in the chaos after the Soviet collapse, and Baranov starts building a new Russia out of deception and force. Olivier Assayas, adapting Giuliano da Empoli's novel with Emmanuel Carrère, keeps the camera close to the men who are doing it.