Konstantin Nazarenko

This film is based on the book about Vasili Ivanovich Chapaev (1887 - 1919) who was in real life the Commander of the 25th Division of the Red Army. Chapaev is an uneducated peasant and a decorated hero in the World War I and later in the Russian Civil War, that followed the Russian revolution. This man of action is fighting on the side of the poor people. His troops consist of peasants, just like him. Unable to write, he can brilliantly demonstrate various battle tactics by moving potatoes on the table. He is street smart. He never lost a battle against the experienced Generals of the Tzar's Army.

The struggle of the Komsomol members against private speculators for the surrender of fish to the state.

My Motherland

Do I Love You?

Личное дело

Semyon Primak, in the direction of the regional committee, arrives in one of the small towns of Donbas and immediately enters into battle with the chief of the mine, Chub, who, in a situation of continuous assault, plays into the hands of the Trotskyites and bandits operating in the mine. Having received moral support from the new secretary, the best 'udarnik', shockworker Matvey Bobylev implements a new method of coal mining and, contrary to the intentions of the enemy group, finds a wide response among the miners of Donbas.

Central Asia during the Civil War. The Jarkent battalion of the Red Army, located in the Verny (now Alma-Ata), receives an order from Frunze to go to the Fergana region to fight the Basmachi. A group of kulaks, with the support of local merchants and beys, incites the unconscious, wavering mass of the Red Army to revolt. The anti-Soviet agitation of counter-revolutionaries, demagogically exploiting the mood of war weariness, provokes an open mutiny in the battalion.

Since director Sergei Yutkevich was a longtime lover of American slapstick, his first films were imbued with a playfulness and cheeriness not typical of Russian cinema. And Kruzheva is a good example of that as he illustrates the friendly rivalries between the youths on village in both a very rough and clowning way.