Thread: Films & TV: Russian & Non - Q&As/Reviews/Links all in here!

How come nobody has mentioned this one, it’s almost criminal not having done that before. If you liked ”The cranes are flying” you’re sure will like this movie too, all the more so when it’s dubbed already.

Impressive! What a surprise! The dubbing is really well done.
As I understand it, Americans during the Cold War knew nothing of life the USSR apart from some exaggerated nonsense and disinformation.They thought it was mostly like a big prison camp.. Judging from the stiff language, the dubbing of this film was done in the 1950s or 1960s. At the height of Americas "anti-communist" (anti-USSR) paranoia!
Well this is certainly is amazing proof of freedom of speech in the US!

But I have heard many Americans make comments which show that they believe that all art (including films) produced in the USSR during this period was purely "propaganda". (Really - if the USSR had done HALF as much propaganda as these people think, then I'm sure it would still exist today....but America might not... lol....)

It's difficult to imagine that there could have been USSR films widely watched in America, or indeed at all...
What about American films in the USSR days, for you who remember it, were you able to watch any?

Well I wonder who did the dubbing of this film and whether the film was watched by a large audience..? Is this a "one off "or were any more films dubbed?

Originally Posted by Johanna

What about American films in the USSR days, for you who remember it, were you able to watch any?

=) When I was a kid I saw films about Lassie and Flipper on Soviet Union TV. I remember "Stunts" (Каскадеры), "The Deep" (Бездна), "Convoy" (Конвой), "Hangar 18" (Ангар 1, "And Justice for All" (Правосудие для всех), "Mackenna's Gold" (Золото Маккены), "Cleopatra" (Клеопатра), "The Vikings" (Викинги), "Some like it Hot" (В джазе только девушки), "Tootsie" (Тутси), "Three Days Of The Condor" (Три дня кондора), "The Domino Principle" (Принцип домино), "The Great race" (Большие гонки) but the episode with gloomy hostile Russia has been cut out, I've seen whole film only several years ago

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (полёт над гнездом кукушки, так кажется он у нас назывался)
O Lucky Man! (О, СЧАСТЛИВЧИК!) The songs in it by Alan Price were what made the film very popular among the young.
Sla Forst Freddy!/Бей первым, Фредди! Don’t remember what it was about other that it was a comedy, there was a guy with a big retractable knife attached to his hand and that we, as kids, laughed our as**s out over it.
A Stitch In Time (Приключения Питкина в больнице) A stupid comedy it must have been, but kids loved it too.

RUSSIAN MOVIE REVIEW

"The Cranes are Flying", (Летят Журавли, Letyat Zhuravli), 1957
(Drama/Romance/War)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cranes_Are_Flying

Movie links:
http://narod.ru/disk/7257110000/The_Cra ... s.avi.html
(see page 13 of this thread for direction on how to download using above link )

OR WATCH ONLINE AT:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CrUu6InN5kw (English subtitles) Part 1 of 10

Awards
Winner of Palme d'Or at the 1958 Cannes Film Festival
Winner of Special Mention Award for Tatyana Samojlova at the 1958 Cannes Film Festival
Winner Diploma of Merit, Foreign Actress (Tatyana Samojlova) at the 1958 Jussi Awards (Finland)

Review
For two days now I have been mentally writing this review. I start with a pristine sheet of paper in my head and see the words flash across the page as the chatter in my brain dictates them and then I realize that I have not correctly expressed myself and I violently crumply the poor defenseless piece of paper and toss it aside and start anew. I can’t begin to tell you all how many virtual trees have been sacrificed for this one review. My lack of education and double or triple Scrabble bonus score words is once again haunting me. How can I adequately convey my thoughts about this movie? I am taking a deep breath and a sip of tea, and I will try yet again.

I believe of all the films I have seen thus far, if I had to recommend one Russian film for someone to see, to say “Hey, you want to see what the folks over in Russia were making back in the day?” I would recommend this film. Because this film would blow their socks off. It has it all, unparallel technical work (cinematography and editing), emotional acting (and attractive actors/actresses), believable script/dialogue (and I only got the subtitles, I can just imagine it in Russian, oh how wonderful it must truly be), realistic settings and costumes, perfect sound effects, and on and on… In short, it is a masterpiece of art.

Yet, I have not mentioned anything about it being “It's one of the Great Patriotic War subject films,” as Olya stated. For me, an outsider, this movie is more about human nature than it is about the war. The war is more of the setting for the story which is being told. Sort of the same way the movie Atonement was for me. That movie also dealt with the war, yet the story was with human nature.

So here we have a fantastic story line going on that happens to be taking place during a war. This setting adds to the story instead of detracting from as it enriches the characters by giving them additional dimensions that otherwise they would not have. Instead of a small palette of colors, we see them in the full spectrum of the rainbow, even though this movie is in black and white. And about it being in black and white…once again, I would NOT colorize this movie. Throughout this movie, the director and cinematographer made phenomenal uses of lighting almost as if the lighting was a character. This could not be done if the movie was in color.

The acting throughout this movie was impeccable. I am truly amazed and saddened that this did not win more awards. I agree with AlexB’s comment about Tatiana Samoylova. If she had been an American actress, she would have been a superstar. Vasili Merkuryev, who I believe played Fedya (Boris' Dad), was also very impressive. The entire cast was just top notch and I feel if this movie had not been Russian, it would have won more awards and would have been recognized for the outstanding work of art it is. What a shame.

One of the parts I loved about this movie, and I need someone to tell me if the English subtitles are anywhere near correct, is the banter back and forth between the family members in the beginning. The subtitles at least, had this as “real” dialogue and not some stupid insipid babel which helped immensely to give the movie its realistic feeling. From the start, you are sucked into the lives of these people because you become part of their world. You become attached and connected to them very quickly and that is in part due to the scriptwriting as well as the acting.

I know Johanna wants to watch this movie, so I do not want to spoil it for her and give away the major plot twists and ending, or for anyone else who may read this and then hopefully want to watch this amazing film. I will say, there were only two scenes that I thought were just a tad over done for me both acting wise and camera effect wise, yet I forgive them as I understood the effect they were going for and maybe on a big screen it worked and just on my little TV it came across as a little too much.

Also without giving too much away, the scene where Veronika goes back to her apartment after the bombing, that was brilliantly done. I got goosebumps watching it. I wonder how many takes they did to get that one just perfect or if they only had one chance to get it right? The clock left there and ticking. Time does not stop, time goes on. Very artistic.

So to sum it all up, I don't see this as a great war film at all.... just simply a great film.

Questions/Comments about the film:
In Boris’ room, on his wall it looks like he has architectural maps rolled up and hanging on the wall next to his bed. Did I miss something? What was his job at the plant? Why would he have those?

I also noticed the statue on his desk. Nicely put there.

At the 6:33 mark in the movie, the subtitles translate the line as “That’s what love is my dear: a harmless mental illness” is that what the dad actually said? I laughed at that, so I hope it was correct.

The cake/strudel the grandmother is cutting at the 8:12 mark, does anyone know what that is? It looks yummy!

The apartment doors open out. I have only seen that on houses in hurricane areas such as Florida. Do most of the doors open out? If so why?

Solaris:which version do you prefer?

Thank you for your review, Rockzmom. I only want to point out that YES, indeed, this film really is about human nature and not about the war itself. But I think American and Russian ideas of "a war movie" differ a lot. The fact is that almost all Russian Great Patriotic War subject movies are, in fact, about people and human nature. They are all about that. So in Russian, "a film about War" means "a film about people in the war". That's the most important thing for me in those movies, and that's what makes them so impressive, what turns them into masterpieces.

Originally Posted by rockzmom

At the 6:33 mark in the movie, the subtitles translate the line as “That’s what love is my dear: a harmless mental illness” is that what the dad actually said? I laughed at that, so I hope it was correct.

He said: "My dear, love is a mutual giddiness".

The previous lines are:
- (wife) He totally turned her head.
- (husband) And she turned his head.

The Russian verb "to turn smb's head" and the noun "giddiness" have the same root in Russian and sound similar.

The cake/strudel the grandmother is cutting at the 8:12 mark, does anyone know what that is? It looks yummy!

It looks like a big пряник... Russian Wiki page

Originally Posted by GreenLarry

Solaris:which version do you prefer?

I think you are asking this question in the wrong forum! The Russian version of course!

I know there is an American version of Solaris, but I've never seen it. However I have seen the Russian version many times.

My guess would be that the American version is a bit more fast paced, and that (in true Hollywood fashion) they changed the plot and the characters as needed (e.g. add some new, remove the less exciting characters).

Originally Posted by GreenLarry

Solaris:which version do you prefer?

The Polish one.

I mean the book.

Originally Posted by BappaBa

Originally Posted by Johanna

What about American films in the USSR days, for you who remember it, were you able to watch any?

=) When I was a kid I saw films about Lassie and Flipper on Soviet Union TV. I remember "Stunts" (Каскадеры), "The Deep" (Бездна), "Convoy" (Конвой), "Hangar 18" (Ангар 1, "And Justice for All" (Правосудие для всех), "Mackenna's Gold" (Золото Маккены), "Cleopatra" (Клеопатра), "The Vikings" (Викинги), "Some like it Hot" (В джазе только девушки), "Tootsie" (Тутси), "Three Days Of The Condor" (Три дня кондора), "The Domino Principle" (Принцип домино), "The Great race" (Большие гонки) but the episode with gloomy hostile Russia has been cut out, I've seen whole film only several years ago

Not bad!
Actually I haven't seen ANY of those films, lol! I know of Lassie though.

When I grew up in Sweden we had only two channels (state owned). The channels had a lofty view of eductating the viewers and refining their tastes in culture. They tried to balance films and programs from Europe (East and West) with American and domestic. I really regretted not being able to watch "Star Trek"! However you could rent this kind of stuff on video if you really wanted it. In their wisdom, our state TV refused to broadcast anyting by Disney, apart from once a year on Christmas eve, lol! But all this came to an end in the early 1990s when two commercial channels were started and people got cable TV. After that, American productions started dominating all of the channels. Sometimes I feel a bit nostalgic about the old setup. There were never any commercials back then! Without these policies in the 1980s I wouldn't know anything about Polish historical dramas, Soviet comedies or German soap operas...... People a few years younger than me know mostly Hollywood productions!

Here is what I really wanted to watch on TV when I grew up... Not available though, so I watched on holidays abroad.
[video:2kusoclm]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XsxgcLf0TSY[/video:2kusoclm]

Originally Posted by Johanna

I really regretted not being able to watch "Star Trek"!

I watched a dozen episodes of Start Trek: The Orginal Series, and, putting it mildly, I was not impressed. Captain James Kirk, with an imbecilic half-smile glued to his face, looks like an effing moron, pardon my French. Most episodes were boring. Spock is good, and Uhura looks striking (when she doesn't sing). Oh, and I liked Scotty too. But, all in all, I didn't really enjoy the series. (But then, I was an adult when I watched it). I don't regret watching it, because now I can better understand my American online friends when they make a reference to it, but I have no desire at all to watch the remaining episodes. Is Star Trek:The Next Generation any better than the original series?

TranslationsMRU - I haven't seen the original StarTrek. But it has lots of famous catch phrases that are used a lot by Americans in particular. Such as:

"It's life Jim, but not as we know it!" ("life" can be replaced with any word.. this means that it is a familiar phenomenon, but not done in the way that you are used to... It's often used in a sarcastic way..)

Beam me up Scotty! (I don't know what this means exactly, but I have heard it a lot of times. Perhaps somebody can explain).

To boldly go where no one has gone before!

Plus many references to the plots and characters of Star Trek.

Star Trek Next Generation was probably pretty good - it was incredibly popular.But to be honest I haven't seen a lot of it. Perhaps it just seemed cool because it was inaccessible... I remember watching it while on holiday in Germany and Israel (dubbed). Because of the dubbing I missed a lot of the plot.

There were two more Star Trek series made after "Next Generation", which I have seen parts of. These are Star Trek Voyager and Star Trek Enterprise. I thought Star Trek Enterprise was the best of those. It has been running on cable TV here in the UK... But I'm a sci-fi fan, so it's not surprising that I like it.. !

Can you recommend any Russian Sci-fi films?

PS - Anybody who hasn't watched 2008 Russian film "The Inhabited Island, " watch it! It's available to download with English subs in the Russian section at Hexagon.cc http://russian.hexagon.cc/torrents

Originally Posted by Johanna

TranslationsMRU - I haven't seen the original StarTrek. But it has lots of famous catch phrases that are used a lot by Americans in particular.

That's exactly the reason I decided to watch it in the first place .
"Beam me up, Scotty" means "Scotty, teleport me back to the ship". Scotty was an engineer in charge of the equipment that was used for teleporting ("beaming") people from and to the ship.

.
Some BRITISH classics for learners of English!

'Allo, 'Allo! From the 1980s. This was super-popular across Europe and it's still running on many channels. It is a parody of life in France, while it was occupied by Germany during the war. It's an hilarious parody of all the nationalities involved.

The story is based around René who owns a café in occupied France. He is trying to be on friendly terms with the Germans while at the same time supporting the French resistance, rescuing stranded British paratroopers, having affairs with the waitresses at the café and making money on the black market... The series was so popular that it ran for almost ten years.The most famous is probably "Listen carefully, I shall say this only once!"

Warning: Never pronounce the word "Colonel" like the do in this series, it's part of the comedy....

[video:1grmgytp]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uh-QtNN5Xiw[/video:1grmgytp]

[video:1grmgytp]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HNStcseZMw0[/video:1grmgytp]


British Political Humour
"Yes Minister!" and "House of Cards..."
(Good for learning RP pronounciation!)

Catch phrase: "You might say so.... But I couldn't POSSIBLY comment... "

Super-evil politician Sir Francis Urquhart who coined the expression above..[video:1grmgytp]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tyex8KswZo[/video:1grmgytp]

Yes Minister! A "good" prime minister with evil advisors...
The scheming Sir Humphreys explains Britain's European policy to the PM...
[video:1grmgytp]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pIXH3-A8zMI[/video:1grmgytp]


ALL OF THIS IS AVAILABLE ON BITTORRENT, NO DOUBT.

Originally Posted by Johanna

What about American films in the USSR days, for you who remember it, were you able to watch any?

Originally Posted by BappaBa

=) When I was a kid I saw films about Lassie and Flipper on Soviet Union TV. I remember "Stunts" (Каскадеры), "The Deep" (Бездна), "Convoy" (Конвой), "Hangar 18" (Ангар 1, "And Justice for All" (Правосудие для всех), "Mackenna's Gold" (Золото Маккены), "Cleopatra" (Клеопатра), "The Vikings" (Викинги), "Some like it Hot" (В джазе только девушки), "Tootsie" (Тутси), "Three Days Of The Condor" (Три дня кондора), "The Domino Principle" (Принцип домино), "The Great race" (Большие гонки) but the episode with gloomy hostile Russia has been cut out, I've seen whole film only several years ago

BappaBa, you are showing your age now. What an interesting assortment of films. Of the films you have listed, I have seen about half of them.

The Deep and one you didn't list "Jaws" I was not allowed to see beacuse I was a swimmer and my grandfather thought they would frighten me too much and I would not want to swim any more, so he made me promise NEVER to read the book or see the movie. To this day I have not broken that promise!!!

"Three Days of the Condor" OMG, how I LOVED, LOVED, LOVED, that movie. I am not certain now if I saw it what I would think of it. I remember that one of the reasons I liked it soooo much was part of it took place near where I lived. So, that was neat for me as a "kid" to hear and see places that I knew. I also thought it was a interesting that they got the area code for Chevy Chase as 202 when very few people knew/know that there were/are ANY phone numbers in Maryland with a 202 area code, almost all of them were 301. As Chevy Chase is on the line that divides Maryland and Washington, DC, there were just a few houses that had the 202 area codes to them (202 is for Washington, DC and now Maryland has more than one area code). The other part was how he could just do EVERYTHING! Maybe he was the prototype for MacGyver??

I never read the book though, did you? It was because of Condor though that I DID read the book The Cuckoo's Egg. Have you read that one? I might swing this over to the Book thread...

Convoy, hehehe.. I saw this one too. My parents had CB radios in their cars and we had one in the house too! I still remember our call numbers after all these years.

Tootsie, I had the girls watch that one last summer. They were LAUGHING!!!

Originally Posted by alexB

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (полёт над гнездом кукушки, так кажется он у нас назывался)
O Lucky Man! (О, СЧАСТЛИВЧИК!) The songs in it by Alan Price were what made the film very popular among the young.
Sla Forst Freddy!/Бей первым, Фредди! Don’t remember what it was about other that it was a comedy, there was a guy with a big retractable knife attached to his hand and that we, as kids, laughed our as**s out over it.
A Stitch In Time (Приключения Питкина в больнице) A stupid comedy it must have been, but kids loved it too.

Alex, Cuckoo's Nest... Jack is a very interesting man as well as actor. I saw Cuckoo when it came out and I remember in high school going to see "The Shining" and actually screaming in the theater. I also saw Chinatown as soon as it came out on DVD. I remember being impressed with that one as well.

A Stitch in Time... At first the girls and I thought you meant the Kim Possible Movie which is a stupic cartoon comedy that the kids love.

Johanna, about the "Beam me up" line... just to expand on it for a sec. When it is used now, it means sarcastically to "get me out (insert your favorite curse word or string of curse words here) of here." There are bumper stickers, signs and stuff that have an added part so that the entire thing is now

"Beam me up Scotty. There's no intelligent life down here."

Originally Posted by Johanna

What about American films in the USSR days, for you who remember it, were you able to watch any?

I remember watching these American movies in a cinema theatre during 1984-88: "Spartak", "Star Wars episode 4" (almost 1/3 was cut out for some reason, when I watched it later on video I was impressed how much scenes I hadn't seen before) , "It's a mad,mad,mad,mad world". I'm sure there were some others, but I can remeber only these three.

Star Wars IV.... That's really the first one, right?

You watched that one in the USSR?! What about the sequels? Well after reading the latest posts I am beginning to think that this censorship that the USSR supposedly engaged in was mostly hype! Were there any program / film that you were aware of and wanted to watch but couldn't?

If you could watch Star Wars and those other films, then you didn't really miss a whole lot of GOOD 1980s Western popular culture! At least not much more than what I "missed" in Sweden! The fact you didn't grew up with Disney and Dallas is probably just healthy. There were some good blockbusters like "Dirty Dancing", "Top Gun" and James Bond... Other than that, no big loss by the sound of things..

It sounds like you got some worthwhile US films after seeing Rockzmoms comment. (I forgot that I HAVE in fact seen "One flew over the Cuckoo's nest.)

The reason they cut Star Wars may not have been anything political - it was seriously cut in Sweden too. I think it was just very violent. As a result the uncut version became very sought after. I don't remember what the difference was.

I guess you missed out on the opportunity to be able to go to the videostore and rent a trashy horror film (about a psychopath killer or something like that) and watch it with friends... I'm not sure that was very culturally enrichening though!

There is one cultural phenomenon that is VERY American which I enjoyed a lot and which has entered popular culture. The Muppet Show.

The reason I thought about this is because there is an expression "Dont' be such a muppet!" or "he's a real muppet" which is quite popular in English. We kept using it at work until it emerged that neither the Serbian nor the Indian colleagues had any idea what a "Muppet" was... But they had started usin the expression anyway. Being a muppet means being a bit comical, irritating and stupid but not necessarily nasty.
[video:n3uks95x]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y89zLBcKlfs[/video:n3uks95x]

Speaking of which.... I read that there was some kind of Russian puppet show which was a political parody and got banned in MODERN times! What was that about? What was the show called, are there any clips? Maybe I got mixed up, but I THINK that's what I read.....

Originally Posted by Johanna

There is one cultural phenomenon that is VERY American which I enjoyed a lot and which has entered popular culture. The Muppet Show.

The reason I thought about this is because there is an expression "Dont' be such a muppet!" or "he's a real muppet" which is quite popular in English.

How interesting because I have never heard those expressions and Maryland is the home of Jim Henson and The Muppets. I wonder if it is a British thing as the shows were filmed over there???

So, Johanna, what do you think of the Swedish Chef? All of the videos on YouTube of Swedish Chef seem to be of very poor quality
[video:33ey25ka]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mbs64GvGgPU[/video:33ey25ka]

For all you Coldplay fans, here is a great fan made video of The Muppets.
[video:33ey25ka]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Phyg_uIPQII[/video:33ey25ka]

I think the forum, at least the Russian part of it, owes Rokzmom much more credit for her Flying Cranes review. I give her my personal thumbs up and acting on behalf of the most of Russians a virtual Golden Palm for best review.