The Book of Masters (Russian: Книга мастеров) is a 2009 fantasy movie, loosely based on Russian fairytales, directed by Vadim Sokolovsky. It's, incidentally, the first Russian-made Disney film.
The Stone Princess, daughter of Baba Yaga, is a formerly nice girl, placed under the curse of a magical stone Alatyr. She is forced to be a prisoner in the Stone Tower until a great stone-cutter brings Alatyr to life, but when that happens, the Princess will gain the power to conquer the world. So she spends her time abducting stone-cutters, forcing them to work on Alatyr and killing them off when they fail to achieve anything.
Her newest target is Ivan, a young, dreamy and highly gifted stone-cutter. He falls in love with the Princess's own daughter Katya, so the Princess exploits it, promising him Katya's hand in marriage if he brings Alatyr to life. After reading the Book of Masters, written by the previous generations of stone-cutters, Ivan manages to do it. Then, of course, the Princess goes back on her word and orders him killed, while planning yet another heinous crime that would make the stone completely alive.
Now it's up to Ivan to save his beloved and potentially the whole world from the stone’s magic.
The film contains examples of:
- Aborted Arc: Ivan's motivation for crossing the Princess's path is seeking revenge for his beloved father whom she had murdered. Except that it's only brought up once, and after the first half of the movie, Ivan's father never even gets mentioned.
- Babies Ever After: In the final scene, the Storyteller says Ivan and Katya had many children.
- Breaking the Fourth Wall: In the end, the Storyteller points at the audience and cries: "Where are you going? I haven't finished the story yet, and everyone's already heading for the exit!"
- Condescending Compassion: The talking horse towards Ivan.Oh, fine, I'll help you. You look a lot like a fool to me, and one should help fools.
- Contrast Montage: Ivan and Katya are being forced into marriages they don't want (with Klava and Yangul respectively). The scene cuts back and forth twice between Ivan, whose antagonists are Laughably Evil and whose Abhorrent Admirer clearly has no deep feelings for him, and Katya, who is stuck in the legitimate Big Bad's tower and whose fiancé is really in love with her and poses a possible threat to Ivan. Additionally, Color-Coded for Your Convenience is used, with the village being brightly-colored and the tower almost completely black.
- Disappeared Dad:
- No information is given on who the Princess's father is.
- Ivan's father was abducted and murdered by the Princess years ago.
- Katya's father is never even mentioned. As it turns out, she's adopted.
- Doting Grandparent: Baba Yaga isn't too nice, but she genuinely loves and tries to protect her granddaughter.
- Easily Forgiven: The heroes never seem to bear a grudge against anyone for long. Especially notable is the case of the landlord and his daughter and mooks, who are apparently forgiven for all their cruelty. They are not magic creatures well-known to be morally grey, if not blue-and-orange (like Baba Yaga), they have not been brainwashed into villainy (like the Princess and, through her, the ardars), and there is no sign they have changed for the better (like Yangul). Nevertheless, Ivan and Katya happily join them in the final celebration without batting an eyelid.
- Engagement Challenge: Subverted. The Princess says she will let Ivan marry Katya when he manages to bring Alatyr to life, but she has no intention of fulfilling her promise.
- Everything's Sparkly with Jewelry: The Stone Princess's gowns and headdresses are fully bejeweled, appropriate for someone who rules over stones and gems and plans to become sovereign of the world.
- Evil Costume Switch: Baba Yaga's daughter wears white in the beginning of the film. After turning into the Stone Princess, she switches to dark colors.
- Evil Is Not Well-Lit:
- The Stone Tower, being the Stone Princess's residence/prison, barely has any light inside.
- It's dark in Baba Yaga's hut when Baba Yaga is acting as an antagonist, and the hut is well-lit when she is helping Ivan.
- Faux Affably Evil: Sometimes the Princess decides to play at being gentle and polite. A special mention goes to the moment where she sweetly tells Katya she'll have to pull out her soul.
- Forced Marriage: Two of these are planned. Neither occurs.
- Ivan is being forced at gunpoint to marry Klava thanks to her most recent whim.
- The Stone Princess orders Yangul and Katya to marry. Yangul is looking forward to it, Katya is assuredly not.
- Genre Deconstruction: Despite being The Chosen One, Ivan is a stone-cutter, not particularly strong physically and inexperienced in battle. When he is outnumbered and/or against anyone stronger, he can't hold his ground in a fight for long. Then Kuzma makes him a Cool Sword… and he still can't hold his ground in a fight for long: the sword might be cool, but Ivan is as inexperienced as before.
- Gilligan Cut: Baba Yaga's standard warning when one comes for a visit is "Mind, I don't have any food!" She uses it twice in the movie, the first time addressing the ardars (the next scene shows her preparing to feed them), the second time to Ivan (the next scene shows him eating).
- Glowing Gem: Alatyr emits a glow in its original form already, and after being brought to life, it shines extremely bright and can be seen from afar.
- Hair-Trigger Temper: The landlord of the village and his daughter Klava can be sent into flying rage very easily.
- Heel–Face Brainwashing: Inverted. The Stone Princess's curse brainwashes her into wickedness.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: The Princess chains the Rusalka to a tree in the Endless Forest. Later, Ivan frees the Rusalka, who in return convinces her fiancé Koshchey to help Ivan.
- I'm a Humanitarian: Baba Yaga is fine with eating humans. However, just as in the original Russian fairytales, she is equally fine with helping them.
- I "Uh" You, Too: Yangul never spells it out that he loves Katya, since he isn't used to having feelings, let alone confessing them. The closest he manages is "I'll do anything you ask". Katya catches the meaning but doesn't reciprocate.
- Let's Fight Like Gentlemen: Downplayed. Yangul gives Ivan a sword identical to his own so that Ivan would be able to defend himself in their fight. However, when one of the combatants is an invulnerable warrior with three hundred years of battle experience and another is a young human stone-cutter with poor fighting skills, the result is pretty predictable anyway.
- Like Father, Like Son: Ivan's father was a good-hearted talented stone-cutter. Ivan takes after him.
- Like Mother, Unlike Daughter: Baba Yaga's daughter was pretty and kind, and the narrator lampshades that she obviously didn't take after her mother. The trope remained in play after the daughter became the Stone Princess: her Faux Affably Evil attitude is in contrast with Affably Evil Baba Yaga.
- Living Statue: The ardars, the Princess's army, are stone statues brought to life.
- Love Dodecahedron: Ivan and Katya fall in love. Yangul loves Katya. Klava has a crush on Ivan but later easily switches to Kuzma. Kuzma loves Klava. The Rusalka flirts with Ivan and is engaged to Koshchey.
- Magic Mirror: The Princess has one. It is forced to answer her questions, but is extremely annoyed with that.
- Mundane Fantastic: Kuzma is asked to make a sword that can cut through stone. In five minutes. His reaction is "Fine, be right with you" and he makes it in less than the required time without batting an eyelid.
- Nice Job Fixing It, Villain: Before his gradual Heel–Face Turn is even shown to start, Yangul unwittingly saves the day. He comes to visit Katya just as Baba Yaga is preparing to cook Ivan. Baba Yaga comes to the gate to meet him, giving Katya just enough time to hide Ivan in a trunk.
- No Man of Woman Born: Per the terms of the spell animating them, ardars will serve the Princess "until the stone weeps, and man shows pity to a stone". The Princess counts as a creature of stone even after her curse is lifted. Although the whole thing amounts to nothing: they just continue to stand there and tag with her when she leaves (apparently, having nothing better to do).
- No Name Given: We never learn the Stone Princess's pre-curse name.
- No Social Skills: Justified, as the Princess never wanted her mooks to socialize with anyone and therefore made them of stone. Yangul has huge trouble making conversation: when he asks Katya to marry him, he starts by saying that she must do so because of the Princess's orders. Of course, it doesn't raise his chances.
- Offscreen Villainy: The ardars raid countries all over the globe and do all sorts of evil. If you don't recall it, it's alright, because it's only mentioned once in the opening narration. They barely get to do anything really villainous afterwards, except for killing Kuzma, who is revived several minutes later, and their leader spends most of his screentime being sweet on Katya.
- Parental Neglect: The Stone Princess has mostly left Katya's upbringing to Baba Yaga.
- Plot Hole: The Princess is imprisoned in her own tower. It is an integral plot point because it's a part of her curse which can't be lifted until Alatyr is fully brought to life. However, she somehow arrives in the village in the final scene, and nobody, not even Katya who knows about the curse, thinks it in any way odd.
- Power Crystal: There's the stone Alatyr that can help the Princess conquer the world. And there are the diamond tears that can reverse Alatyr's power and lift the Princess's curse.
- Rejection Affection:
- Yangul asks Katya to accept him three times, despite always getting rejected. The last time she spells it out that he can only make her stay with him by issuing a Scarpia Ultimatum, and he can't bring himself to do it and lets her go.
- Klava doesn't get the hint that Ivan doesn't want to marry her, not even when he's bound and gagged. She still continues to demand to marry him.
- Meanwhile, Kuzma constantly makes eyes at Klava and at one point tries to climb onto her balcony at night. She is only annoyed. Until she finally gives up on Ivan and falls for Kuzma immediately.
- Rescue Romance: Subverted. Klava is more than eager to marry Ivan after he saves her life, but Ivan is not willing in the slightest.
- Selective Obliviousness: The side effect of being in love.
- The Stone Princess's order is to bring back Ivan and Katya, who have just escaped the tower. She specifically needs Ivan alive for now, to work on Alatyr. Yangul, madly jealous, ignores the last part and challenges Ivan to a fight.
- Ivan is so sure the Princess will let him marry Katya that he fails to notice the many clues that point otherwise: Katya repeatedly says he is being deceived, Yangul makes it clear Katya is promised to him, and then the Princess takes over Katya's body and whisks the girl back to the tower.
- Spoiled Brat: Klava, the landlord's daughter who thinks the world revolves around her. Her father spoils her rotten to the point that she has a birthday celebration every day.
- Stupid Evil: The Stone Princess quickly kills off the masters who fail to bring Alatyr to life, instead of letting them live as long as possible, increasing the chances for them to eventually succeed.
- Taken for Granite:
- This fate presumably awaits Katya when her soul is sucked into a magical stone. The process is stopped and reversed with a timely rescue.
- Later on, the Stone Princess turns Yangul to stone for making a Heel–Face Turn and defying her. The character's ultimate fate isn't specified, but hopeful fans have speculated she lifts the spell after her own Heel–Face Turn.
- Taking the Bullet: Katya jumps in front of Ivan when one of the drunk villagers shoots at him.
- Treasure Is Bigger in Fiction: Ivan, a poor village lad with no family, somehow finds loads and loads of precious and semi-precious gems for his stone-cutting exercises. And nobody thinks it odd.
- Unexpected Kindness: Subverted. The Stone Princess, the Big Bad, sees her daughter Katya prepared to run away with Ivan and suddenly smiles and gives them her permission to marry. Katya is very surprised and asks once again if she means it, and the Princess smiles again, confirms it, but immediately explains that she'll only allow their marriage if Ivan helps her create her Artefact of Doom. Eventually, it's made clear she doesn't intend to honour her promise even in that case.
- Uniformity Exception: The ardars are an army of stone golem Faceless Goons, and their commander Yangul has human looks. He is the one who loves Katya and ultimately does a Heel–Face Turn.
- Why Waste a Wedding?: When Ivan and Klava's wedding is stopped, Klava wails she wants to get married just so badly. Kuzma gets the bride's approval and steps in as the bridegroom at once.
- Yes-Man: The chief stone-cutter is such a lickspittle towards the landlord that even the landlord himself is annoyed.
