History Film / GentlemenOfFortune

* TheChick: Vasily Alibabaevich. He was incarcerated for petty fraud (mixing gasoline with donkey urine and then selling it), has a soft heart, loves children and [[EvenBadMenLoveTheirMamas his mother]], hates himself for stealing money, cooks the food, washes clothes, and acts as a conscience for the whole gang.

* SmashCut: Vasily, who has become TheChick, is cooking dinner for the rest of the gang. He has something in a pan, and he tries to set a match to it. He is surprised by an enormous tower of flame rising far above his head. Cut to the entire building on fire and burning to the ground, as Vasily and the others watch from the outside.

Soviet comedy (with elements of tragedy) about a kindergarten teacher (Troshkin) who looks exactly like hardened criminal Beliy and gets recruited by the police to infiltrate his old gang in prison (while Beliy himself is doing time in another prison) to find the previously stolen helmet of UsefulNotes/AlexanderTheGreat. Written by Creator/GeorgiDanelia, Viktoriya Tokareva and Aleksandr Seryj (who also directed the film).

* ThievesCant: Before going into prison, Yevgeny is schooled by a policeman in thieves' cant. Later, Yevgeny makes a point of reversing this, teaching Fenya the normal Russian words for criminal slang.

* CoolHelmet: The MacGuffin.
* CriminalDoppelganger: Beliy to Troshkin.

* MacGuffin: UsefulNotes/AlexanderTheGreat's helm.

* TheChick: Vasily Alibabaevich. He was incarcerated for petty fraud (mixing gasoline with donkey urine and then selling it), has a soft heart, loves children and [[EvenBadMenLoveTheirMamas his mother]], hates himself for stealing money, cooks the food, washes clothes, and acts as a conscience for the whole gang.

Soviet comedy (with elements of tragedy) about kindergarten teacher (Troshkin) who looks exactly like hardened criminal Beliy and gets recruited by police to infiltrate his old gang in prison (while Beliy himself is doing time in another prison) to find previously stolen helmet of UsefulNotes/AlexanderTheGreat. Written by Creator/GeorgiDanelia, Viktoriya Tokareva and Aleksandr Seryj (who also directed the film).

* AssassinOutclassin: After Beliy escapes from prison, he meets up with an associate of his at a construction site. However, the associate has previously met Troshkin and assumes that Beliy is an impostor, so him and a friend of his jump Beliy. Beliy manages to push the friend off a building and then kills his associate with the guy's own gun (the last part isn't shown but can be inferred).

* BewareTheNiceOnes: While, for most of the film, Troshkin is only pretending to be a cold-blooded murderer, he does it effectively enough to convince two of the Docent's own partners. Additionally, when he finally faces off against his CriminalDoppelganger, he manages to temporarily disarm the criminal before the latter pulls a gun. It's stated early in the film that Troshkin is a UsefulNotes/WorldWarII vet.

* CriminalDoppelganger: Beliy to Troshkin
* ChessMotifs: There is a chessboard in prison cell (!) and Sad Sack wins a few games with a random guy to get civilian clothes for himself after the prison break.

* DubNameChange: Sad Sack is named Raspy in some dubs and subtitled versions
* EvenEvilHasStandards: By the end of the movie his gang decide to turn themselves in and bring Troshkin to the cops, because they think he killed an elderly woman doctor.

** Beliy's buddies don't know the exact addresses of whom Beliy met in Moscow to sell the golden helmet, but at least they can show the places on-site, so the police orchestrates a fake prison break just for them. Of course, it does not go as planned (instead of getting to the already-prepared spot with money and civilian clothes, they end up 30 kilometers away with no money, no clothes and [[RuleOfFunny all covered in concrete]]), but all in all it still goes surprisingly well.

* MoodWhiplash: During a funny scene where Troshkin is making Alibabaevich and Crosseyes play a kindergarten game, Troshkin makes Crosseyes leave the room. He walks back in and tells the gang that [[spoiler:Raspy hung himself]]
* ReformedCriminal: when Troshkin tries to contact one of the Beliy's former associates he informs him that last time they met he promised to throw him down the stairs because he was out. After reminding him of the promise he does exactly that.
* ReversePsychology: Troshkin gives the Cross-eyed a speech seemingly mocking an honest citizen's life and glorifying a thief's life, but does it in a way that makes it into exactly opposite.
--> '''Troshkin''': Steal, drink - go to prison. Steal, drink - go to prison. Glorious!
* ShownTheirWork: The director made the movie right after he did his time in prison and portrayed his own personal experiences about the criminal life. Also a part of a [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fenya criminal slang]] that characters speak is genuine. Another one contains some random words because the authors did not want to spread jail slang. For example, people in Russia right now are sure, that редиска (radish) means “bad man”.

* TheChick: Vasily Alibabaevich. He was incarcerated for petty fraud (mixing gasoline with donkey urine and then selling it), has a soft heart, loves children and [[EvenBadMenLoveTheirMamas his mother]], hates himself for stealing money, cooks the food, washes clothes, and acts as a conscience for the whole gang

* ShownTheirWork: The director made the movie right after he did his time in prison and portrayed his own personal experiences about the criminal life. Also a part of a [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fenya criminal slang]] that characters speak is genuine. Another one contains some random words because the authors did not want to spread jail slang. For example many people in Russia right now are sure, that редиска (radish) means “bad man”.

* ShownTheirWork: The director made the movie right after he did his time in prison and portrayed his own personal experiences about the criminal life. Also a part of a [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fenya criminal slang]] that characters speak is genuine. Another one contains some random words because the authors did not want to spread jail slang. For example many people in Russia right now are sure, that редиска (radish) means “bad man”.

* ShownTheirWork: The director made the movie right after he did his time in prison and portrayed his own personal experiences about the criminal life. Also all the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fenya criminal slang]] that characters speak is genuine.

You can watch ''Gentlemen of Fortune'' on [[https://russianfilmhub.com/movies/gentlemen-of-fortune-1971/ Russian Film Hub]].

* DisguisedInDrag: The gang, to keep a low profile in Moscow, disguise themselves as a bunch of old women. Then, [[WhatAnIdiot Cross-eyed tries to flirt with a girl he meets on the street. And then enters the men's room in the theater]].

* MeanCharacterNiceActor: Part of the ActingForTwo challenge for Leonov, as his real-life personality was much closer to Troshkin than to Beliy.

* GreatEscape: Beliy's buddies don't know the exact addresses of whom Beliy met in Moscow to sell the golden helmet, but at least they can show the places on-site, so the police orchestrates a fake prison break just for them. Of course, it does not go as planned (instead of getting to the already-prepared spot with money and civilian clothes, they end up 30 kilometers away with no money, no clothes and [[RuleOfFunny all covered in concrete]]), but all in all it still goes surprisingly well.

* BewareTheNiceOnes: While, for most of the film, Troshkin is only pretending to be a cold-blooded murderer, he does it effectively enough to convince two of the Docent's own partners. Additionally, when he finally faces off against his CriminalDoppelganger, he manages to temporarily disarm the criminal before the latter pulls a gun. It's stated early in the film that Troshkin is a WorldWarTwo vet.

* MirrorMatch: At the end, Troshkin and Beliy square off, and the timid kindergarten director actually manages to temporarily disarm the knife-wielding criminal (it's stated early in the film that he's a WorldWarTwo vet). The fight ends when Beliy pulls a gun.

Soviet comedy (with elements of tragedy) about kindergarten teacher (Troshkin) who looks exactly like hardened criminal Beliy and gets recruited by police to infiltrate his old gang in prison (while Beliy himself is doing time in another prison) to find previously stolen helmet of AlexanderTheGreat. Written by Creator/GeorgiDanelia, Viktoriya Tokareva and Aleksandr Seryj (who also directed the film).

* MacGuffin: AlexanderTheGreat's helm.

* WhichRestroomDilemma: Happens during the DisguisedInDrag scene, when Cross-eyed enters the wrong bathroom at the theater.

* DirectorDisplacement: Many people think ''Gentlemen of Fortune'' was directed by Creator/GeorgiDanelia (who was a co-writer and art director).

* ActingForTwo: YevgenyLeonov plays both Beliy, a ruthless murderer and Troshkin, a soft-spoken kindergarten teacher.

* PlayingAgainstType: By the time movie was made, Vitsin (Sad Sack) had a successful career playing one of the Soviet cinema's ComicTrio (as the Coward), and had been typecast to play weak comedic characters with high-pitched voices. In this movie he plays a truly tragic character who speaks with a hoarse voice and [[spoiler:tries to commit suicide]].

* ActingForTwo: YevgenyLeonov plays both Beliy -- ruthless murderer and Troshkin -- soft-spoken kindergarten teacher.

* GreatEscape: Beliy's buddies don't know the exact addresses of whom Beliy met in Moscow to sell the golden helmet, but at least they can show the places on-site, so the police orchestrates a fake prison break just for them. Of course, it does not go as planned (instead of getting to the already-prepared spot with money and civilian clothes, they end up 30 kilometers away with no money, no clothes and [[RuleOfFunny all covered in concrete]]), but all in all it still goes surprisingly successful.

* PlayingAgainstType: By the time movie was made, Vitsin (Sad Sack) has made a successful career playing one of the Soviet cinema's ComicTrio (as the Coward), and has been typecasted to play weakling comedic characters with high-pitched voices. In this movie he plays a truly tragic character who speaks with a hoarse voice and [[spoiler:tries to commit suicide]].

--> '''Troshkin''': Steal, get drink - get in prison. Steal, get drink - get in prison. Glorious!

* ChessMotifs: There is a chessboard in prison cell (!) and Sad Sack wins a few games with random guy to get civilian clothes for himself after the prison break.
* DisguisedInDrag: gang, to keep low-profile in Moscow, disguise themselves as bunch of old women. Then, [[WhatAnIdiot Cross-eyed tries to flirt with a girl he met on the street. And then enters men's room in the theater]].
* DirectorDisplacement: Many people think ''Gentlemen of Fortune'' was directed by Creator/GeorgiDanelia (who was co-writer and art director).
* EvenEvilHasStandards: By the end of the movie his gang decide to turn themselves in and bring Troshkin to the cops, because they think he killed elderly woman doctor.

* GreatEscape: Beliy's buddies don't know the exact addresses of who Beliy met in Moscow to sell the golden helmet, but at least they can show the places on-site, so the police orchestrates a fake prison break just for them. Of course, it does not go as planned (instead of getting to the already-prepared spot with money and civilian clothes, they end up 30 kilometers away with no money, no clothes and [[RuleOfFunny all covered in concrete]]), but all in all it still goes surprisingly successful.

* MacGuffin: Alexander the Great's helm.
* MeanCharacterNiceActor: Part of the ActingForTwo challenge for Leonov, as his real-life personality was much closer to Troshkin than to Belyi.
* PlayingAgainstType: by the time movie was made, Vitsin (Sad Sack) has made a successful career playing one of the soviet cinema's ComicTrio (as Coward), and has been typecasted to play weakling comedic characters with high-pitched voices. In this movie he plays truly tragical character who speaks with hoarse voice and [[spoiler: tries to commit suicide]].

* ShownTheirWork: the director made the movie right after he did his time in prison and portrayed his own personal experiences about the criminal life. Also all the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fenya criminal slang]] that characters speak is genuine.

* SurpriseCheckMate: [[JustifiedTrope Justified]]. Sad Sack wins this way in the hotel, because his opponent is a [[TheGamblingAddict gambling addict]] and will play anything. He then receives surprise checkmate himself when Cross-eyed bungles his moves.
* TattooedCrook: Beliy. Troshkin has to make the same fake tattoos to pose as him. Apparently, film crew had a little too much fun with those tattoos, because there is no way kittens and lamp bulbs are parts of [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criminal_tattoo#Criminal_tattoos russian criminal tattoo ideography]].
* TheChick: Vasily Alibabaevich. He was incarcerated for petty fraud (mixing gasoline with donkey urine and then selling it), has soft heart, loves children and [[EvenBadMenLoveTheirMamas his mother]], hates himself for stealing money, cooks the food, washes clothes, and works as a conscience for the whole gang
* WhichRestroomDilemma

* GreatEscape: Beliy's buddies don't know the exact addresses of who Beliy met in Moscow to sell golden helmet but at least they can show places on site, so police orchestrates fake prison break just for them. Of course, it does not go as planned (instead of getting to already prepared spot with money and civilian clothes, they end up 30 kilometers away with no money, no clothes and [[RuleOfFunny all covered in concrete]]), but all in all it still goes surprisingly successful.

Soviet comedy (with elements of tragedy) about kindergarten teacher (Troshkin) who looks exactly like hardened criminal Beliy and gets recruited by police to infiltrate his old gang in prison (while Beliy himself is doing time in another prison) to find previously stolen helmet of AlexanderTheGreat. Written by GeorgiDanelia, Viktoriya Tokareva and Aleksandr Seryj (who also directed the film).

* DirectorDisplacement: Many people think ''Gentlemen of Fortune'' was directed by GeorgiDanelia (who was co-writer and art director).