Sci-fi from Russia starts with a certain advantage if you’re not from there. The Cyrillic script adds an alien frisson, and expectations are raised because of its proud heritage. Could Obratimaya Realnost (or Обратимая Реалность, to be precise) aka Reversible Reality be another Stalker or Solaris, a Kin-dza-dza! or Inquest of Pilot Pirx?
To bring things crashing down to earth, no is the answer, though there is a lot to like here. It’s a story about a contested future where most people are happy to live out their lives subsumed in virtual-reality scenarios, while a refusenik band of “Antivirts” seek to overthrow the New Life corporation running everything. To infiltrate the rebels, in old-school style, a handsome and ruthless operative named Mikhail (Pavel Chinaryov) is sent in undercover at New Life HQ, where leaks in the code are leading to regular glitches in the VR. Main suspect: Vika (Vera Kolesnikova), an attractive recent arrival from the Jobs University, who – get this – would rather read a book on her journey to work than disappear into the VR worlds her fellow commuters prefer. Talking of which, when was the last time you saw someone on a train reading a paper? We’re not so far from this version of the future already, and co-writer/director Dmitriy Konstantinov knows it.
As part of Mikhail’s plan to get close to Vika, he takes her into various “realities” with him, on a series of dates, in effect – an idyllic afternoon in a rowing boat, a night at a gig etc. And, as blindness follows a total eclipse, he eventually falls for her, though for professional reasons he obviously shouldn’t.
Is Vika really one of the Antivirts? Watch and see. The more interesting aspect is the world-building by Konstantinov and a talented production team, and his portrayal of a future that’s taken the Aldous Huxley rather than George Orwell path – people embracing their own enslavement rather than having it forced on them.
That “Jobs University” is a nice touch. Do they mean Steve Jobs? Is he responsible for the sweet servitude on display here? Or is it the University of Jobs, a place where a degree does nothing more than guarantee employment? Bleak, either way. Another nice touch is that in this world where everyone has a relationship with a database rather than another human, Mikhail is being professionally run by his own brother, Yuriy (Anton Filipenko), who’s even more of a badass than he is.
Paul Verhoeven’s Total Recall and Starship Troopers provide the authoritarian template, Blade Runner the dark, paranoid atmosphere and Minority Report the colourways, screens and surveillance tech. Those are the starting points and Konstantinov builds on them with some flair – the way people’s eyes light up when they’re in VR mode is both useful and creepy.
Vera Kolesnikova’s big eyes and flawless skin almost compensate for the lack of chemistry between her and co-star Chinaryov, and the stuttering rhythm to Konstantinov’s direction doesn’t help things either. But a big plus is the serpentine performance by Timofey Tribuntsev, who plays Vika’s boss, a scourge to his underlings but yes-man to the higher-ups, only too happy to implement whatever New Life decrees – a ban on pets is their latest ruse to reduce contact with reality even further.
The political critique sits there on the shelf for anyone who wants it, though it’s hard to nail Putin onto this scenario, except very shakily.
In the end it is, sadly, less than the sum of its parts. Some good performances, some interesting production design, a plot that eventually does start twisting – though that does all come rather late. But it’s Russian, so I’m giving it a bye. Bye!
Reversible Reality – Watch it/buy it at Amazon
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© Steve Morrissey 2026
