Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Cinema
In the Hollywood hills they have Leo the MGM lion, and in Sparrow Hills they have the
iconic socialist sculpture,
Worker and Peasant Woman,
the instantly recognisable logo of
Mosfilm. Russia's largest film studio has played a defining role in the development of
Soviet and Russian cinema.
MOSCOW DOESN'T BELIEVE IN TEARS
Three young women arrive in the capital in 1958, starting new careers and looking for
love. They become friends. This is the simple premise of one of the most iconic films
to come out of the Soviet Union, Moscow Doesn't Believe in Tears,which won the
Academy Award for Best Foreign Film in 1980. The three friends follow different paths,
of course, and the film then flashes forward 20 years to show us how things turn out.
Along the way, we get insights into class consciousness (yes, even in the Soviet
Union) and romantic relationships - with plenty of shots of 1970s Moscow as a back-
drop.
Revolutionary Cinema
During the Soviet period, politics and cinema were always closely connected. The nascent
film industry received a big boost from the Bolshevik Revolution, as the proletarian culture
needed a different kind of canvas. Comrade Lenin recognised that motion pictures would
become the new mass medium for the new mass politics. By government decree, the film
studio Mosfilm was officially founded in 1923, under the leadership of Alexander Khan-
zhokov, the pioneer of Russian cinema.
In this golden age, Soviet film earned an international reputation for its artistic experi-
mentation and propaganda techniques. Legendary director Sergei Eisentein, a socialist true
believer, popularised a series of innovations, such as fast-paced montage editing and moun-
ted tracking cameras, to arouse emotional response from the audience that could be used to
shape political views. His
Battleship Potemkin
(1925) remains one of film history's most ad-
mired and most studied silent classics.
Irony of Fate(1975) is a classic that is still screened on TV every New Year's Eve. After a
mind-bending party in Moscow, the protagonist wakes up in St Petersburg, where his key
fits into the lock of an identical building at the same address in a different town. Comedy
ensues.
