Government official

Pyryev directs the edge of his satire against bureaucracy and bureaucratic psychology among some layers of Soviet employees ^[1] .

The film was severely criticized and banned from showing. In those days there were many officials who believed that in a socialist society there was no place for satire ^[2] . “The film turned out to be harmful and formalistic,” Pyryev later wrote with hidden irony. After some time, Ivan Pyryev was returned to the studio with a demand “to eliminate the mistakes made” while working on “The State Official”. Pyryev was forced to remount his film and, if necessary, complete new scenes. As a result of the re-assembly of the “State Official”, all the moral monsters-bureaucrats were presented as wreckers and saboteurs working in the interests of the Industrial Party .

According to the memoirs of Mikhail Romm , it was a rare case when the artist was ordered to mutilate his own masterpiece with his own hands.

Edited movie lasting 71 minutes. It was released on July 13, 1931 , but it did not achieve much success with the viewer.

The leader of the wrecking group, who is seated on the board of the railway industry, is doing everything to disorganize the work of the railway transport. He gives up the damaged locomotives for scrapping instead of fixing them. One day he receives an important foreigner, ready to give money for the development of railways. However, the bureaucrat is doing everything to ensure that this venture fails: under various pretexts he keeps a foreigner at his place for up to two hours, and at 2 o’clock the ticket office closes. Apollo Fokin, a cashier with 20 years of experience, works at the box office. At 2 o’clock the bureaucrat releases the sponsor, he runs to the cash register, and barely manages to hand the money (1 million) to Fokin. Then the pest organizes a raid on the cashier. Cashier Andrei Fokin is resisting, and no one unnoticed bag with money is under the stairs. The cashier’s wife discovers the bag, and he gets the opportunity to appropriate the money. He and his wife distribute money for the necessary needs, but here the robber appears and demands money for himself. The cashier is trying to bargain for at least 40,000 for his daughter’s dowry, but the robber is implacable. He takes the money and tries to hide, but the cashier catches up with him, a fight begins between them, and the cashier wins. The money goes to the development of the railway industry. Fokine want to submit to the award. He imagines himself as an important boss. However, many voices are opposed to him, and the reward is denied to him.

• Maxim Strauch - Apollon Fokine
• Lyubov Nenasheva - Fokin's wife
• Naum Rogozhin - Aristarkh Razverzaev
• Leonid Yurenev - von Meck, standing higher
• Alexander Antonov - chairman of the board of the road
• Ivan Bobrov is a “truly Russian” person
• Tatyana Barysheva - nun
• Natalya Vasilyeva

• Government official on a site dedicated to Ivan Pyryev
• Maxim Straukh in the film by Ivan Pyryev "State Official" (1930)
• Government official