Abigail (Tinatin Dalakishvili) lives in a town that, due to a mysterious epidemic, has been sealed off from the outside world for many years. Among those taken ill was Abby’s father, Jonathan Foster (Eddie Marsan), a renowned scientist whom the government subsequently abducted. While searching for her father Abby discovers the epidemic was a ruse conceived by the Special Department as a means of containing people gifted with magical powers. It so happens Abigail is such a person. Gifted with tremendous power she joins a brave band of rebels determined to overthrow their oppressors and free the Forbidden City.
This elaborate Russian fantasy adventure is laden with heady concepts and hugely evocative world-building yet hobbled by a shaky narrative that is unnecessarily hard to follow. Writer-director Aleksandr Boguslavskiy flings viewers headfirst into an oddball, densely-realized alternate reality but proves frustratingly vague when it comes to shading in details. Along the same lines as American-made young adult like The Hunger Games (2012) and Divergent (2014) series; Magical Adventures in the Forbidden City (originally titled simply: Abigail) is another dystopian fantasy wherein a determined young brunette heroine must learn to use her wits and hard-won survival skills in order to overthrow an oppressive regime. Handily aided by a hunky boy, in this instance resistance leader Bale (Gleb Bochkov). Indeed as imported British special guest star Eddie Marsan's scientist character says at one point: "Sometimes in order to be a human being you have to say no. Even to the King." Thus imparting an anti-authoritarian subtext to the story that somehow slipped past the Russian censor.
Mixed with the dystopian allegory is a dash of Harry Potter. Once Abby's magical abilities are awakened she stumbles upon a hidden community of wizards that serve as her tutors. With their wacky wigs and eccentric facial hair the supporting cast of colourful oddballs vaguely evoke the fairytale fantasies of vintage Russian genre auteurs Aleksandr Ptushko and Aleksandr Row. Incidentally, why are all Russian fantasy filmmakers are named Aleksandr? Anyway, Boguslavskiy pulls off a few genuinely magical moments. The production design, with its wintery steampunk fairytale setting, is truly sumptuous. Every corner of the frame has been filled with interesting details while the lighting is exquisite. Aspects of the gloomy titular city seem designed to explicitly evoke Soviet era Moscow while the contagion driven plot cannot help but stir inescapable memories of the real life pandemic. Yet for the film's allegorical aspirations and sporadically striking set-pieces it remains dramatically inert. Laden with exposition and scowling confrontations, but low on suspense and excitement. Its principal villain (Artyom Tkachenko) is so underwritten and generic you barely notice he is even there. As heroine Abby, Georgian model and actress Tinatin Dalakishvili, looking like Kristin Stewart in a Beatle wig, proves a quirky focal point. However the artificial sounding English dub does no favours (save Eddie Marsan who retains his voice) for her nor any of the supporting cast. A curious choice given the Russian actors clearly filmed their lines in English.
