An interesting aspect is that, while working on the first draft of the script all the characters were already becoming clearly delineated, the actions getting concretized and structured independent of my own volition. It became an independent process, entered my life and began to influence it. In fact, .even while shooting Nostalgia, my first foreign film, the idea that the film was influencing my life would not leave me. A look at the scenario shows that Gorchakov comes to Italy just for a short period—but in the film he dies there. In other words, he does not return to Russia not because be doesn't want to but because fate decides otherwise. I too did not envisage staying on in Italy after completing the shooting of the film. But, like Gorchakov, I was subordinate to a Higher Will. There was another extremely sad factor that set me thinking even further. Anatoly Solonit-syn died. He had been the main actor in all my previous films and was to have played Gorchakov in Nostalgia and Alexander in The Sacrifice. He died of the disease that Alexander is cured of and to which I will succumb in a few years. What does all this mean ? I don't know. But what I do know is that it is very frightening. I am, however, convinced that the poetic image will concretize itself, the truth that has to be arrived at will materialize and lend itself to unravelling, and whether I like it or not, it will influence my life. ... One thing is certain, after having discovered such truths a human being cannot remain passive : after all, these truths have revealed themselves to him despite his will. They have thrown overboard or changed all his earlier conceptions of the world and his own fate. A kind of schism is created and he begins to feel responsible for others. He is an instrument, a medium obliged to live for others and influence them. In this sense A.S. Pushkin was correct. He considered a poet (and I have always thought of myself more as a poet than a cinematographer) to be a prophet despite himself. The ability to look into time and predict the future was regarded as an awful gift by Pushkin, rte suffered a lot in this role that was ordained for him. He was superstitious about all events and signs pertaining to the future. Let us recall the time when Pushkin rushed from Pskov to Petersburg where, at that time, the Decembrist revolt was being organized. A rabbit crossed the path of the coach. Knowing it to be an evil omen Pushkin turned back. In one of his poems Pushkin describes the torment he suffers for having the gift of prophecy. These long-forgotten lines came back to me like a revelation. I feel that it was not just Alexander Pushkin who wrote this verse in 1826 but some presence standing behind him. Athirst in spirit, through the gloom Of an unpeopled waste I blundered, And saw a six-winged seraph loom 72 Numbers 12-13