In VLC Media Player , you can also go to Tools > Preferences > Subtitles / OSD and set the "Default encoding" to Cyrillic (Windows-1251) .
Many Russian subtitle files use Windows-1251 (CP-1251) encoding, while modern players expect UTF-8 . The Fix:
If the text becomes readable, select "Save with Encoding" -> "UTF-8".
For English or other language tracks, OpenSubtitles and Subscene are the most reliable. Search for "Gerda 2021" specifically to ensure they match the BluRay frame rate (23.976 fps).