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death to the sound of the Star Wars sound track. This was how he saw himself, his life, his crimes. All the pain and death he had caused and suffered were viewed by him through the corny music and cloud-machine smoke of a bad action movie.
    “What sort of films inspire you?” we asked.
    Vitaly paused.
    “ Titanic . That’s a real film. With DiCaprio. That’s real life. That’s the sort of thing I aim to make if I get my budget. . . . ”
    That was the last time I had seen him, three years before. But I was still reminded of him often. There’s a little scene that gets played out on the Ostankino channels every week. The president sits at the head of a long table. Along each side sit the governors of every region: the western, central, northeastern, and so on. The president points to each one, who tells him what’s going on in his patch. “Rogue terrorists, pensions unpaid, fuel shortages. . . . ” The governors looked petrified. The president toys with them, pure Vitaly. “Well, if you can’t sort out the mess in your backyard, we can always find a different governor. . . . ” For a long time I couldn’t remember what the scene reminded me of. Then I realized: it’s straight out of The Godfather , when Marlon Brando gathers the mafia bosses from the five boroughs. Quentin Tarantino used a similar scene when Lucy Liu meets with the heads of the Tokyo Yakuza clans in Kill Bill —it’s a mafia movie trope. And it fits the image the Kremlin has for the President: he is dressed like a mob boss (the black polo top underneath the black suit), and his sound bites come straight out of gangster flicks (“we’ll shoot the enemy while he’s on the shitter . . . ”). I can see the spin doctors’ logic: Whom do the people respect the most? Gangsters. So let’s make our leader look like a gangster; let’s make him act like Vitaly.
    But while the country’s leaders were imitating gangsters, word went out from the Ministry of Culture and Ostankino that the Kremlin wanted positive, upbeat films. Russian gangster movies, which should theoretically have rivaled the greatest in the world, were phased out. Actors who had primed themselves to be the Russian De Niros suddenly had to revamp their images and star in rom-coms. It’s the reverse of the situation in the West, where politicians try to act like upstanding citizens while films and TV shows are obsessed with the underworld; here the politicians imitate mobsters but the films are rosy. Whenever I pitch a gangster program to TNT, they stare, aghast: “We make happy things, Peter. Happy!” I supposed Vitaly never found money for his blockbuster. I was a little worried for him.
    •  •  •
    Vitaly was at the station to meet me. He was wearing his usual ironed tracksuit; it had been a while since I’d seen anybody wear one. He greeted me warmly. I sensed he was genuinely glad to see someone from the “old days.”
    “Thanks for coming.”
    “You live in D— now?”
    “I’m lying low. I avoid Moscow: too many cops wanting to check your documents. Everyone back home has been put away, the last of my crew. I wouldn’t have anyone to film with even if I could raise the money.”
    I sensed Vitaly was flirting with his old profession, but I thought it best not to pry. We walked over to his car: a brand new four-by-four (of course). No plates. Vitaly had a freshly pressed shell suit hanging in the back.
    “I’m living in the car while I lie low. I’ve always preferred it to apartments anyway.”
    “Whatever happened to your film project?” I ask.
    “I met some Moscow producers. They wanted me to show them a script. Do they think I’m stupid? I know they’ll just steal it.”
    “But Vitaly, that’s how it works here. You’d have a copyright, guarantees.”
    “That means nothing. You can’t trust producers, they’re all crooks. I tried to get money from my own people, mob bosses. People you can trust. But none of them wanted to invest in