Europe is no model for Russian Cannes director

MOSCOW, May 18 (Reuters) Russian film director Andrei Zvyagintsev may be a darling of old European festivals but he refuses to define his style as belonging to the continent, preferring to dub it universal.

Zvyagintsev became an international sensation in 2003 when his debut film ''The Return'' won the top prize at Venice Film Festival, and his new feature ''The Banishment'' (''Izgnaniye'') -- a tragic tale of a married couple's relationship -- has been selected for the Cannes festival which opened this week.

''I assure you I have no intention of trying to fit into the European context. I have no intention to be like them,'' Zvyagintsev told Reuters after a private viewing of his new film in Moscow.

''I do what I think is right, what worries me, what alarms me, what makes me lose sleep, what I think is beautiful.'' People from six countries have worked on ''The Banishment'', including the leading actress from Sweden, and it has been filmed on locations in France, Belgium and ex-Soviet Moldova.

All signs of nationality, religion and even time have been stripped from the plot, the scenery and the names of the characters, so the story could be unravelling in almost any country anytime over the past half a century.

''The themes that interest me in the cinema that I make are universal I think ... love, hate, patience, betrayal, courage,'' the youthful 43-year-old director said.

CANNES RIVALS ''The Banishment'' faces competition from films by Quentin Tarantino and Gus Van Sant who have both won the coveted Palme d'Or, the top prize at Cannes.

But neither the rivalry with the renowned U.S. directors nor approaches from Hollywood mean Zvyagintsev's films or Russian cinema on the whole will ever match the reach and box-office sales of US film industry, the self-effacing Russian says.

Following the success of ''The Return'', Zvyagintsev received offers of cooperation from actor and producer Brad Pitt and a Los Angeles film company.

''As much as we may try to imitate them, to compete with them, it's pointless. This industry is 100 years old and it's nothing else but an industry, I'm not talking about independent cinema,'' Zvyagintsev said of Hollywood. ''We will never get into this and there's no need to.'' Instead Zvyagintsev says he is more interested in making films that ''concern the interests and touch the heart of a person who speaks any language''.

The producer of both ''The Return'' and ''The Banishment'', Dmitry Lesnevsky, says Zvyagintsev's timeless and placeless style fits today's complex and contradictory world.

''It is interesting today to create a cinema language. In this case I mean a supranational language of art.'' ''The Banishment'' will hardly gain the hordes of fans that Tarantino's ''Kill Bill'' did but it is sure to attract an intimate and faithful circle of followers.

''The showing is a closed one, only for the film crew,'' bespectacled Zvyagintsev told a packed audience inside a large cinema hall where his new film was screened.

''I didn't know that the film crew had so many relatives and friends,'' he added with a smile.

Reuters SYU VV1823