Film noir and the Soviet Union were incompatible. With some exceptions, the Soviet regime only approved of films that embodied socialist realism, the official art style that glorified the values of state communism, which left little room for moral ambiguity, social rebellion, and bleak endings. For example, Anatoli Rybakov’s anonymously named Delo No. 306 (US: Case No. 306), while offering sufficient noir elements for fans of the style, was approved for production as a way to elevate the reputation of the Soviet police. Boris Bityukov stars as police captain Masarin, who leads the investigation of a hit and run accident by connecting witnesses to car thieves to more witnesses to spies to accomplices and all the way back to a Nazi concentration camp during the war. The film’s procedural nature keeps up an exciting pace that commands audience attention and delivers narrative payoffs that raise the story far above police work.