Overview
- The feature adapts Giuliano da Empoli’s 2022 bestseller, with a screenplay developed by Olivier Assayas and Emmanuel Carrère.
- Jude Law portrays a president figure as Paul Dano plays a shadow adviser explicitly inspired by Vladislav Surkov.
- Coverage underscores the film’s fictionalization even as it revisits Surkov’s real trajectory, including 2014 U.S. and EU sanctions and a 2020 decree ending his official Kremlin role.
- In a 2025 interview with L’Express, Surkov defended authoritarian governance and called Ukraine “an artificial political entity,” framing expansion as essential to Russia.
- Production encountered hurdles over language, locations, budget and casting, according to Télérama’s account of the film’s development.