A Companion to Russian Cinema (Wiley Blackwell Companions to National Cinemas)

__A Companion to Russian Cinema__ provides an exhaustive and carefully organised guide to the cinema of pre-Revolutionary Russia, of the Soviet era, as well as post-Soviet Russian cinema, edited by one of the most established and knowledgeable scholars in Russian cinema studies. * The most up-to-date and thorough coverage of Russian, Soviet and post-Soviet cinema, which also effectively fills gaps in the existing scholarship in the field * This is the first volume on Russian cinema to explore specifically the history of movie theatres, studios, and educational institutions * The editor is one of the most established and knowledgeable scholars in Russian cinema studies, and contributions come from leading experts in the field of Russian Studies, Film Studies and Visual Culture * Chapters consider the arts of scriptwriting, sound, production design, costumes and cinematography * Provides five portraits of key figures in Soviet and Russia film history, whose works have been somewhat neglected Title Page 5 Copyright Page 6 Contents 7 Notes on Contributors 10 Acknowledgments 17 Notes on Transliteration and References 18 Introduction 19 The Field 19 The Project and its Structure 22 References 34 Part I Structures of Production, Formation, and Exhibition 39 Chapter 1 The Film Palaces of Nevsky Prospect: A History of St Petersburg’s Cinemas, 1900–1910 41 Notes 60 References 60 Chapter 2 (V)GIK and the History of Film Education in the Soviet Union, 1920s–1930s 63 Film Education in the Soviet Union 63 Foundational Years: 1919–1924: Striving for the Method and the Victory of the Academic Model 66 Centralization and Reorganization: 1924–1930 70 From GTK to (V)GIK (1930–1937) 74 Notes 81 References 82 Chapter 3 Lenfilm: The Birth and Death of an Institutional Aesthetic 84 Vernacular Eccentricity 84 Heroic Romanticism 92 Avant-Garde as Tradition 96 Vernacular Postmodernism 100 Conclusion 105 Notes 105 References 106 Chapter 4 The Adventures of the Kulturfilm in Soviet Russia 110 Cultural, Enlightening, Useful: The Elusive Film Classification 111 Kulturfilms in the Soviet Studio Landscape 116 Creative Interpretations 121 The Death of the Concept 124 Notes 128 References 129 Chapter 5 Soiuzdetfilm: The Birth of Soviet Children’s Film and the Child Actor 135 The Creation of Soiuzdetfilm 136 Getting Inside the Child’s Head 137 Children Performing Children 138 Childhood, Difference, and Ideology 140 Donskoi’s Approach to Acting 142 Reception 147 Soiuzdetfilm: Setting Generic Models 148 Notes 151 References 151 Part II For the State or For the Audience? Auteurism, Genre, and Global Markets 155 Chapter 6 The Stalinist Musical: Socialist Realism and Revolutionary Romanticism 157 Notes 173 References 173 Chapter 7 Soviet Film Comedy of the 1950s and 1960s: Innovation and Restoration 176 Notes 193 References 194 Chapter 8 Auteur Cinema during the Thaw and Stagnation 196 Toward the Idea of a Director as an “Auteur” 196 The Tolerated Margin 202 The Individual and the Collective 204 Cinema in a Logo-Centric System 205 The Unbearable Sadness of Life 207 The Persistent Point of View 210 Metacinema 211 The Forgotten Audience 212 The Fresh Breeze of Perestroika 213 Notes 214 References 216 Chapter 9 The Blokbaster: How Russian Cinema Learned to Love Hollywood 220 Goodbye America, Hello Hollywood: The Rise of the Russian Blockbuster in the Late 1990s 224 Lovey Dovey: Importing the American Dream 230 From Blockbusters to Blokbusters: Russifying Content 234 Conclusion 237 Notes 238 References 239 Chapter 10 The Global and the National in Post‐Soviet Russian Cinema (2004–2012) 242 Research Methods 244 Results of Research 250 References 265 Part III Sound – Image – Text 267 Chapter 11 The Literary Scenario and the Soviet Screenwriting Tradition 269 The Iron Scenario and the Emotional Scenario 270 The Establishment of the Literary Scenario 275 The Implications of the Literary Scenario 279 Conclusion 283 Notes 285 References 285 Chapter 12 Ideology, Technology, Aesthetics: Early Experiments in Soviet Color Film, 1931–1945 288 Introduction 288 Initial Explorations 291 The Importance of Color Processes Pioneered Abroad 293 Critical Reception of Early Soviet Color Films 300 Conclusion 305 Notes 306 References 306 Chapter 13 Learning to Speak Soviet: Soviet Cinema and the Coming of Sound 310 Machines Speaking to Machines 319 Multi-Lingualism, or the Problem of Language in Soviet Cinema 324 Notes 329 References 329 Chapter 14 Cinema and the Art of Being: Towards a History of Early Soviet Set Design 332 Set Design: The Scholarly Field 334 The Russian Context: Background and Practicalities 335 The Soviet Designers 337 In Search of the Soviet Interior 341 Notes 350 Chapter 15 Stars on Screen and Red Carpet 355 Notes 376 References 379 Chapter 16 Revenge of the Cameramen:: Soviet Cinematographers in the Director’s Chair 382 The Versatile Professional: Iurii Zheliabuzhskii 383 Too Little, Too Late: Eduard Tissé 385 Passion and Restraint: Mikhail Kalatozov 387 The Betrayed Loyalist: Boris Volchek 392 The Camera Purist: Sergei Urusevskii 398 Conclusion 401 Notes 403 References 405 Part IV Time and Space, History and Place 407 Chapter 17 Soldiers, Sailors, and Commissars:: The Revolutionary Hero in Soviet Cinema of the 1930s 409 Chapaev 410 We are from Kronstadt 415 Shchors 420 Notes 425 References 425 Chapter 18 Defending the Motherland: The Soviet and Russian War Film 427 Shaping Memory: Understanding the Russian War Film 428 A Patriotic Spectacle 429 Pasha’s Patriotism 433 The Responsibility for the Motherland 436 No Choice but to Defend 438 Conclusion: The Malleable Motherland 441 Note 443 References 443 Chapter 19 Shooting Location: Riga 445 Riga as Soviet West 448 Riga through Latvian Eyes 454 The Baltic as Soviet Little Europe 460 Conclusion 464 Notes 466 References 467 Chapter 20 Capital Images: Moscow on Screen 470 The Soviet Capital 471 “Little” Moscow 477 “Fixing” the Image 481 Crime Scene: Moscow 486 The Empty Space 487 Conclusion 490 Notes 491 References 491 Part V Directors’ Portraits 493 Chapter 21 Boris Barnet: “This doubly accursed cinema” 495 A Moscow Youth: The “Champion of Denmark” 496 Working with Kuleshov 496 First Films as a Director: The 1920s Comedies 497 Politics and History, Love and Levity 501 The Wartime Films 507 The Films of the Late Stalin Years: Innovation and Frustration 509 Slow Fade 512 Notes 514 References 515 Chapter 22 Iulii Raizman: Private Lives and Intimacy under Communism 518 The Apolitical Revolutionary Film: The Last Night 520 Love at a Time of War: Mashenka 523 1950s and 1960s: And What if it is Love? and Your Contemporary 527 Soviet Men and Women of the 1970s and 1980s: A Strange Woman, Private Life and A Time of Desires 531 Conclusion 534 References 534 Chapter 23 The Man Who Made Them Laugh: Leonid Gaidai, the King of Soviet Comedy 537 Gaidai’s Comedy and Soviet Culture 538 The Making of the King 542 The Golden Decade 547 The Decline and the Second Life 555 Notes 557 References 559 Chapter 24 Aleksei Gherman: The Last Soviet Auteur 561 Notes 579 References 581 Chapter 25 Knowledge (Imperfective): Andrei Zviagintsev and Contemporary Cinema 583 Biographical Aside 584 The First Technique: Inversion 587 The Second Technique: Effacement 590 The Third Technique: Indeterminacy 593 Love, Knowledge, Prophecy 594 Notes 598 References 600 Appendix Chronology of Events in Russian Cinema and History 603 Notes 631 Bibliography 632 Index 649 EULA 675