Nikolai Sidorov-Frantsuzov is a Russian filmmaker and screenwriter, born in 1991 in Kazan. From 2011 to 2015, he studied screenwriting at the Gerasimov Institute of Cinematography (VGIK), followed by directing at Konstantin Bogomolov’s programme at the Chekhov Moscow Art Theatre. As a director, he works across short films, advertising and music videos. His debut short Yof (2017), a nostalgic comedy about teenagers in the 1990s, received the Grand Prix at the Dvizhenie Film Festival and was nominated for the Golden Eagle, Russia’s national film award. He has also directed music videos that have collectively received more than 65 million views on YouTube, as well as advertising projects for brands including L'Oréal, MAC Cosmetics, Paramount Channel, Vogue, BORK, Ekonika and Nivea. In 2023, he created and served as showrunner of the documentary series Iconic Places of Russian Literature, released on the Kinopoisk platform. In 2025, he directed and wrote the video component of the exhibition Open Storage. Backstein. Function² at Garage Museum of Contemporary Art in Moscow, based entirely on archival video material from the collection of art critic and curator Joseph Backstein.
The Tale of Threads and Needle is a dark fairy tale about two queens—one in white feathers, the other with black wings—who clash over a prince. But the prince is not a prize, but a deception: love turns into illusion, while he himself becomes a snake, the embodiment of desire and evil. Their confrontation gradually reveals itself as an allegory of war, in which there are no winners or losers, because in the end, everyone is defeated.
When the conflict is over, the world freezes like a painting. Silent bodies lie still, black ashes fall onto pale skin, while hearts continue to beat, waiting for the next touch. Will it bring another blow, or will it finally become an act of love? Through its highly stylised imagery, The Tale of Threads and Needle explores desire, violence and the fragile boundary between love and destruction.