USSR

  • Roman Kachanov – Avrora AKA Aurora (1973)

    1971-1980AnimationRoman KachanovUSSR

    The Aurora (Авро́ра) is a Russian protected cruiser, currently preserved as a museum ship in St. Petersburg. She became a symbol of the Communist Revolution in Russia.
    During the First World War the ship operated in the Baltic Sea. At the end of 1916, the ship was moved to Saint Petersburg (then Petrograd) for a major repair. The city was brimming with revolutionary ferment and part of her crew joined the 1917 February Revolution. A revolutionary committee was created on the ship (Aleksandr Belyshev was elected its captain). Most of the crew joined the Bolsheviks, who were preparing for a Communist revolution.
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  • Aleksandr Dovzhenko – The Cultural Heritage [Disc 1] (1926 – 1928)

    1921-1930Aleksandr DovzhenkoArthouseSilentUSSR

    Love’s Berries 1926
    The mistress of hairdresser Jean Kovbasyuk throws a baby up to him. Jean decides in any method to be delivered from a “natural” child…Getting a call to the judicial investigator, Kovbasyuk is given up to search a child. A mistress labours for in the court of people’s “justice”. However much it turns out after registration of marriage, that Jean and in actual fact was not the father of child. But lately…Read More »

  • Aleksandr Dovzhenko – Arsenal (The Cultural Heritage) [Disc 2] (1928)

    Drama1921-1930Aleksandr DovzhenkoArthouseUSSR

    In Arsenal, Alexander Dovzhenko, perhaps the most radical of the Soviet directors of the silent period, altered the already extended conventions of cinematic structure to a degree greater than had even the innovative Sergei Eisenstein in his bold October. The effect of this tinkering with the more or less accepted proprieties of motion picture construction produced a work that is actually less a film than it is a highly symbolic visual poem. For example, in a more linearly structured piece like October, the metaphors, allusions, and analogies that arise through the construction of the various montages replace rather than comment on essential actions within the film. In Arsenal, however, the symbolism is so purposely esoteric, with seemingly deliberate barriers established to block the viewer’s perception, that the relationship of individual symbols or sequences to the various actions of the film is not immediately clear.Read More »

  • Aleksandr Dovzhenko – Zemlya – versions of 1930 & 1971 (The Cultural Heritage [Disc 3]) (1930)

    1921-1930Aleksandr DovzhenkoArthouseDramaUSSR

    Earh (1930) 59 min.
    Poetic cinema story about events related to collectivization in Ukraine at the end of 20th years of the last century, about creation of the first of a collective farm communes, about class enmity on a village.
    The best film Dovzhenko and one of the best films in history world to the cinema.
    A film “Earth” on the World exhibition in Brussels of 1958 was adopted among the twelve best films of all times and people as a result of questioning, conducted Belgian cinematic among 117 film critics andconnoisseurs of the films from 26 countries of the world. During many subsequent years “Earth” was multiple included in the various lists of the best films of the world of XX century.Read More »

  • Ivan Pyryev – Skazanie o zemle sibirskoy AKA The Tale of Siberian Land (1947)

    1941-1950DramaIvan PyryevMusicalUSSR

    From Mosfilm:
    Andrey Balashov, a pianist, had to quit music after being wounded during the Great Patriotic War. Having failed to say goodbye to his friends and Natasha whom he loved he left for Siberia. He worked at the construction of an industrial complex and sang in a teahouse. An accidental meeting with his friends and Natasha changed his life. Andrey left for the Arctic region where being inspired by heroic labor of the builders he wrote a symphonic oratorio «Tale of Siberian Land» that won everybody’s recognition and made him popular in Moscow where Natasha was looking forward to see her true-love.Read More »

  • Aleksandr Sokurov – Samye Zemnye Zaboty aka Le Piú Terrene Occupazione (1974)

    1971-1980Aleksandr SokurovDocumentaryShort FilmUSSR

    A documentary film about the agricultural development in the region of Gorky: the everyday life in a sovkhoz, the building of a reservoir and of a greenhouse.Read More »

  • Aleksandr Medvedkin – Noch Nad Kitaem AKA Night Over China (1971)

    1971-1980Aleksandr MedvedkinDocumentaryPoliticsUSSR

    Description: Soviet documentary “defending the Chinese people from their enemies, the Maoists”. NB: The film clearly documents the activities of the Red Guards although it never mentions them by name. This has been reflected in the cataloguing. Also, ‘Peking’ has been used instead of ‘Beijing’, again to reflect the content of the film.Read More »

  • Yevgeni Chervyakov – Moy syn (1928)

    1921-1930DramaSilentUSSRYevgeni Chervyakov

    Synopsis: A woman announces her husband that her newborn baby isn’t his. What follows is a simple and powerful sequence of close-ups of a man caught in his mixed emotions and a woman obsessed with the child’s well-being.Read More »

  • Georgi Kropachyov & Konstantin Yershov – Viy AKA Viy or Spirit of Evil (1967)

    1961-1970ClassicsGeorgi Kropachyov and Konstantin YershovHorrorUSSR

    This Russian film adaptation of Nikolai Gogol’s story was for a long time the only horror film made in the Soviet Union. Khoma (Leonid Kuravlev), a young novice, travels across the countryside and stays for a night in a barn that belongs to an ugly old woman. When she attacks him at night and takes him for a broom ride, the scared novice fatally wounds her, and before she dies, she turns into a beautiful young noblewoman (Natalya Varley). The latter leaves a will, according to which Khoma should pray for her for three nights in the chapel until her body is buried. At night, the witch rises from the coffin and tries to catch Khoma. She flies around but she can’t reach him or see him because he stays inside the circle that he has drawn around himself. During the third and last night, the witch makes the last attempt to scare him out of the circle, and she calls all sorts of ugly creatures to help her… Gogol wrote several stories based on Ukrainian folklore, many of them dealing with the Devil and the supernatural. ~ Yuri German, All Movie GuideRead More »

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