A few, hypnotically bad minutes of âKhraniteli,â the recently rediscovered 1991 Soviet TV adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkienâs âThe Fellowship of the Ring,â should be enough to get your week off to a start from which you may never recover.
I donât want to overstate its disorienting effect. But understating it would be a dereliction of duty.
Last week, without fanfare, the state-run Russian TV station 5TV posted the rarity on YouTube. The 105-minute Russian-language adaptation reportedly aired once before slipping, Gollum-like, into the vaults of what was then known as Leningrad Television.
An April 5 story in the Guardian stoked interest among Tolkienâs adoring English- (and, of course, Elvish-) speaking millions.