2021
Film by Oleg Mavromatti
USA, Estonia, Russia, Bulgaria 1:17 h
The young vlogger Maximka (playing himself) shares his revelations about life, death, women, and capitalism before making the decision of sex change. He claims he will do the surgery himself and next we already see him as a woman (played by Kana Se). Then she shares her thoughts about the transformation and that life as a woman is not what she expected.
Director, scriptwriter, editor: Oleg Mavromatti
Cast: Kana Se, Maxim Shalko, Alexey Makeev
Camera: Kana Se, Maxim Shalko, Alexey Makeev
“The hero of the “Pancake Machine” – Maxim Shalko of Berdyansk – worships the famous madman AlexTime, who stabbed a man and is serving time in a Mexican prison. Maxim wants to get rich or exist back in the USSR, find a girlfriend, or change his sex.
His monologues sound against the background of amateur recordings of the post-Soviet chaos found on the Internet: a hurricane brought down trees and the cars cannot pass, and a tanned summer resident (“dachnik”) in swimming pants stares blankly at the fire in a neighbor’s house.
The hero of the film, Oleg Mavromatti, raises a barbell with iron “pancakes” and thus turns into a “pancake machine.” At the beginning of the film, the ritual effigy of Maslenitsa burns, in the finale, we see the major temple of Russian art blown up.”
Dmitriy Volchek, “People, Robots, Pigs and Meteors : The Best Films of 2019.” Radio Freedom
