The films of Kira Muratova with War and Peace as an overture
I have talked about this a few times, but I have never finished it yet, it is an undertaking but it is, and I can confirm this with absolute sincerity that it is among the greatest achievements in all of cinema. The Russians in the 60s wanted to prove their filmmaking might with this, and if there's more like this that i'm aware of it is sadly reduced to the usual suspects Eisenstein and Tarkovsky and a few others, some like Parajanov is within the territory, that is seemingly annex worthy, I don't believe such a should be the case, but that's a whole other thing.
I want to celebrate great films no matter where they come from, here we have what i've so far sensed as an elevated form of film, which as far as I can tell from the totality of what I've seen as being the sort of thing Luchino Visconti did with his The Leopard, an arthouse staple. Imagine if The Leopard was 3 times as long, and there we have what War and Peace here is.
I would also like to read the Tolstoy novel at some point, and it would have to be read without recording, for pronouncing Russian names and places has always been a handicap.
The parts and the supplements!!
With what I've posted today for films I shall be supping on for the rest of the weekend, and during next week.
Each weekend we get closer to 1,000, 1,000 films I shall include in what would constitute a Treasury. Uniquely my own as any collection of music and books would be, covering the whole matter they are represented as such as.
I’ll list as I recall the other great Russian films I’ve seen
Viy
Come and See
The Asthenic Syndrome
Larissa Shepitko— Wings and The Ascent
The Ukranian Vera Chytilova .... need to see her other films!!
Few filmmakers have forged a voice as singular and uncategorizable as that of Ukrainian iconoclast Kira Muratova. Working on the margins of Soviet and post-Soviet cinema, she withstood decades of censorship to realize her uncompromising vision in fascinatingly fragmented, expressionistically heightened works that employ melodrama, satire, and absurdism to explore the psychic toll of life under oppressive political, social, and domestic systems. Her films—including the impressionistic family portrait THE LONG FAREWELL, her radical glasnost-era masterpiece THE ASTHENIC SYNDROME, and the dark con-artist comedy THE TUNER—delight in disorder and contradiction as they deconstruct the very language of cinema itself.
9 of 1,000
Brief Encounters
Directed by Kira Muratova • 1967 • Ukraine, Soviet Union
Starring Nina Ruslanova, Vladimir Vysotskiy, Kira Muratova
Kira Muratova’s first solo feature already displays her sui generis approach to cinema, in an impressionistic portrait of women at work and in love. Through an intricate play of flashbacks and shifting perspectives, BRIEF ENCOUNTERS reveals the tangled romantic triangle that connects a hard-nosed city planner (played by Muratova herself), her free-spirited geologist husband (legendary Soviet protest singer Vladimir Vysotskiy), and the young woman from the countryside (Nina Ruslanova) whom she hires as her housekeeper. Blending observational realism with striking New Wave–style experimentation, Muratova crafts a wryly perceptive study of two very different women bound by chance and each navigating her own career, dreams, and disappointments.
Directed by Kira Muratova • 1967 • Ukraine, Soviet Union
Starring Nina Ruslanova, Vladimir Vysotskiy, Kira Muratova
Kira Muratova’s first solo feature already displays her sui generis approach to cinema, in an impressionistic portrait of women at work and in love. Through an intricate play of flashbacks and shifting perspectives, BRIEF ENCOUNTERS reveals the tangled romantic triangle that connects a hard-nosed city planner (played by Muratova herself), her free-spirited geologist husband (legendary Soviet protest singer Vladimir Vysotskiy), and the young woman from the countryside (Nina Ruslanova) whom she hires as her housekeeper. Blending observational realism with striking New Wave–style experimentation, Muratova crafts a wryly perceptive study of two very different women bound by chance and each navigating her own career, dreams, and disappointments.
[media=https://youtu.be/Qaj3RRFNP5c]
One criticism — fake looking beard!!
10 of 1,000
The Long Farewell
Directed by Kira Muratova • 1971 • Ukraine, Soviet Union
Starring Zinaida Sharko, Oleg Vladimirsky, Yuri Kayurov
With its daring formalist freedom, Kira Muratova’s pointillist family portrait so perplexed and unnerved Soviet censors that it effectively halted her career for years afterward. A kind of psychological breakup movie, THE LONG FAREWELL traces the growing rift that develops between an emotionally impulsive single mother (stage legend Zinaida Sharko, transcendent in one of her first film roles) and her increasingly resentful teenage son (Oleg Vladimirsky), who upends her world when he announces that he wishes to live with his faraway father. The seemingly simple premise is rendered anything but by Muratova’s dreamy, drifting style, with off-kilter framing, editing, and dialogue continually pushing cinema’s aesthetic and expressive boundaries outward.
Directed by Kira Muratova • 1971 • Ukraine, Soviet Union
Starring Zinaida Sharko, Oleg Vladimirsky, Yuri Kayurov
With its daring formalist freedom, Kira Muratova’s pointillist family portrait so perplexed and unnerved Soviet censors that it effectively halted her career for years afterward. A kind of psychological breakup movie, THE LONG FAREWELL traces the growing rift that develops between an emotionally impulsive single mother (stage legend Zinaida Sharko, transcendent in one of her first film roles) and her increasingly resentful teenage son (Oleg Vladimirsky), who upends her world when he announces that he wishes to live with his faraway father. The seemingly simple premise is rendered anything but by Muratova’s dreamy, drifting style, with off-kilter framing, editing, and dialogue continually pushing cinema’s aesthetic and expressive boundaries outward.
11 of 1,000
The Asthenic Syndrome
Directed by Kira Muratova • 1989 • Ukraine, Soviet Union
Starring Olga Antonova, Sergei Popov, Galina Zakhurdayeva
Widely considered Kira Muratova’s masterpiece, THE ASTHENIC SYNDROME is also Soviet cinema’s grand avant-comic opus, a deconstructive portrait of the nation in the final, frenzied stages of the communist experiment. For its first forty minutes, shot in black and white, SYNDROME tells the story of a grieving widow (Olga Antonova) at wit’s end, lashing out at strangers on the street, impulsively quitting her nursing job, and sleeping with random men. Cut to a disastrous post-screening Q&A with Antonova: we’ve just watched a film-within-a-film as slept through by Nikolai (Sergei Popov, one of Muratova’s co-screenwriters), a narcoleptic schoolteacher whose subsequent wanderings lead to encounters (between sudden naps) with an expansive cross section of the failing Soviet Union’s beleaguered citizenry—digressive vignettes at once bizarre, disturbing, and hilarious. Deftly applying dizzying metafiction to her inimitable brand of humanistic farce, THE ASTHENIC SYNDROME is an ingenious fractal puzzle that captures the delirious death throes of an entire epoch.
Directed by Kira Muratova • 1989 • Ukraine, Soviet Union
Starring Olga Antonova, Sergei Popov, Galina Zakhurdayeva
Widely considered Kira Muratova’s masterpiece, THE ASTHENIC SYNDROME is also Soviet cinema’s grand avant-comic opus, a deconstructive portrait of the nation in the final, frenzied stages of the communist experiment. For its first forty minutes, shot in black and white, SYNDROME tells the story of a grieving widow (Olga Antonova) at wit’s end, lashing out at strangers on the street, impulsively quitting her nursing job, and sleeping with random men. Cut to a disastrous post-screening Q&A with Antonova: we’ve just watched a film-within-a-film as slept through by Nikolai (Sergei Popov, one of Muratova’s co-screenwriters), a narcoleptic schoolteacher whose subsequent wanderings lead to encounters (between sudden naps) with an expansive cross section of the failing Soviet Union’s beleaguered citizenry—digressive vignettes at once bizarre, disturbing, and hilarious. Deftly applying dizzying metafiction to her inimitable brand of humanistic farce, THE ASTHENIC SYNDROME is an ingenious fractal puzzle that captures the delirious death throes of an entire epoch.
[media=https://youtu.be/sWFc8507ysg]
12 of 1,000
The Tuner
Directed by Kira Muratova • 2004 • Russia, Ukraine
Starring Alla Demidova, Nina Ruslanova, Renata Litvinova
Adapted from selected stories by Arkady Koshko, THE TUNER is Kira Muratova’s pitch-black con-artist comedy as well as a veritable masterclass in slow-burn unpredictability Capitalizing on an overheard conversation, low-tier schemer Andrey (Georgiy Deliev) disguises himself as a piano tuner to access the apartment of Anna (Alla Demidova), a wealthy older woman. After quickly befriending Anna and her longtime nurse Lyuba (Nina Ruslanova), Andrey lets his girlfriend, Lina (Renata Litvinova), in on his ruse, inspiring ideas of murder and robbery in the unscrupulous beauty. But Andrey hatches a more devious plan: gain Anna’s trust by getting back the thousands of dollars that Lyuba lost to her own swindlers—and then go in for the big con. Shot in sumptuous black-and-white and featuring brilliant performances from a cast of Russian and Ukrainian all-stars, THE TUNER viciously satirizes a post-Soviet society of naivety, duplicity, and greed.
Directed by Kira Muratova • 2004 • Russia, Ukraine
Starring Alla Demidova, Nina Ruslanova, Renata Litvinova
Adapted from selected stories by Arkady Koshko, THE TUNER is Kira Muratova’s pitch-black con-artist comedy as well as a veritable masterclass in slow-burn unpredictability Capitalizing on an overheard conversation, low-tier schemer Andrey (Georgiy Deliev) disguises himself as a piano tuner to access the apartment of Anna (Alla Demidova), a wealthy older woman. After quickly befriending Anna and her longtime nurse Lyuba (Nina Ruslanova), Andrey lets his girlfriend, Lina (Renata Litvinova), in on his ruse, inspiring ideas of murder and robbery in the unscrupulous beauty. But Andrey hatches a more devious plan: gain Anna’s trust by getting back the thousands of dollars that Lyuba lost to her own swindlers—and then go in for the big con. Shot in sumptuous black-and-white and featuring brilliant performances from a cast of Russian and Ukrainian all-stars, THE TUNER viciously satirizes a post-Soviet society of naivety, duplicity, and greed.
13 of 1,000
Change of Fate
Directed by Kira Muratova • 1987 • Ukraine, Soviet Union
Starring Natalya Leble, Yuriy Shlykov, Vladimir Karasyov
Kira Muratova’s typically idiosyncratic adaptation of W. Somerset Maugham’s play “The Letter” unfolds in an outpost in colonial Asia where Maria (Natalya Leble, in a role most famously played on-screen by Bette Davis), the wife of a government official, kills her lover in what seems to be an act of self-defense—until the appearance of an incriminating letter casts doubt on her version of events. Making experimental use of audio and repetition, Muratova boldly deconstructs the narrative into a fascinating, often absurdist exploration of colonial guilt and moral degradation.
Directed by Kira Muratova • 1987 • Ukraine, Soviet Union
Starring Natalya Leble, Yuriy Shlykov, Vladimir Karasyov
Kira Muratova’s typically idiosyncratic adaptation of W. Somerset Maugham’s play “The Letter” unfolds in an outpost in colonial Asia where Maria (Natalya Leble, in a role most famously played on-screen by Bette Davis), the wife of a government official, kills her lover in what seems to be an act of self-defense—until the appearance of an incriminating letter casts doubt on her version of events. Making experimental use of audio and repetition, Muratova boldly deconstructs the narrative into a fascinating, often absurdist exploration of colonial guilt and moral degradation.
14 of 1,000
Three Stories
Directed by Kira Muratova • 1997 • Russia, Ukraine
Starring Sergey Makovetskiy, Renata Litvinova, Oleg Tabakov
In Kira Muratova’s darkly ironic triptych, three seemingly unlikely people are driven to murder—shocking acts of violence rendered by the director as a kind of monstrous comedy of the absurd. A mild-mannered clerk’s annoyance with his troublesome neighbor reaches the breaking point, a misanthropic hospital worker channels her anger at her mother into a startling act of revenge, and a sweetly innocent-seeming young girl turns out to be capable of the most heinous of crimes. Working in her famously abstract style, Muratova uses these grimly farcical tales to explore the inherent irrationality of human nature.
Directed by Kira Muratova • 1997 • Russia, Ukraine
Starring Sergey Makovetskiy, Renata Litvinova, Oleg Tabakov
In Kira Muratova’s darkly ironic triptych, three seemingly unlikely people are driven to murder—shocking acts of violence rendered by the director as a kind of monstrous comedy of the absurd. A mild-mannered clerk’s annoyance with his troublesome neighbor reaches the breaking point, a misanthropic hospital worker channels her anger at her mother into a startling act of revenge, and a sweetly innocent-seeming young girl turns out to be capable of the most heinous of crimes. Working in her famously abstract style, Muratova uses these grimly farcical tales to explore the inherent irrationality of human nature.
15 of 1,000
Among Grey Stones
Directed by Kira Muratova • 1983 • Ukraine, Soviet Union
Starring Igor Sharapov, Oksana Shlapak, Stanislav Govorukhin
In AMONG GREY STONES, Kira Muratova crafts a dreamlike coming-of-age tale, adapted from a short story by legendary Ukrainian writer Vladimir Korolenko. Reeling from the death of his beloved mother and the negligence of his father (Stanislav Govorukhin), a powerful judge, ten-year-old Vasya (Igor Sharapov) forms a friendship with Valyok (Roman Levchenko) and Marusya (Oksana Shlapak), vagabond children who have taken refuge with a homeless man (Sergei Popov) in a crumbling church. Exposed to the desperate circumstances of a people whom he never knew existed, and enlivened by his new companions’ generosity and compassion, Vasya steals his sister’s porcelain doll to comfort the dying Marusya, setting his real and surrogate families on a potentially tragic collision course. Surreal, humanistic, and shot through with the endless wonder of childhood discovery, AMONG GREY STONES stands as one of Kira Muratova’s finest achievements, despite being re-edited by Soviet censors.
Directed by Kira Muratova • 1983 • Ukraine, Soviet Union
Starring Igor Sharapov, Oksana Shlapak, Stanislav Govorukhin
In AMONG GREY STONES, Kira Muratova crafts a dreamlike coming-of-age tale, adapted from a short story by legendary Ukrainian writer Vladimir Korolenko. Reeling from the death of his beloved mother and the negligence of his father (Stanislav Govorukhin), a powerful judge, ten-year-old Vasya (Igor Sharapov) forms a friendship with Valyok (Roman Levchenko) and Marusya (Oksana Shlapak), vagabond children who have taken refuge with a homeless man (Sergei Popov) in a crumbling church. Exposed to the desperate circumstances of a people whom he never knew existed, and enlivened by his new companions’ generosity and compassion, Vasya steals his sister’s porcelain doll to comfort the dying Marusya, setting his real and surrogate families on a potentially tragic collision course. Surreal, humanistic, and shot through with the endless wonder of childhood discovery, AMONG GREY STONES stands as one of Kira Muratova’s finest achievements, despite being re-edited by Soviet censors.
46-50, M