Mikhail Troyanovsky

This remarkable film is based on P. Bazhov’s fairy tale “The Malachite Box”. Little Danila was the most inquisitive apprentice of old Prokopich, a famous stone-carving master. Years passed… Like his teacher, the grown-up Danila has learned to feel the soul of his material and became an expert in handling rare precious stones found in the Ural Mountains. One day he met the Mistress of the Copper Mountain, a fairy who ordered for herself an unusual stone flower.

Sadko is based on an opera by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, which was based on a Russian epic tale of the same name. In the old Russian city of Novgorod, the merchants are feasting in a gorgeous palace and Sadko is bragging that he can bring to their land a sweet-voiced bird of happiness. They laugh at him, but he is offered help by the Ocean King's daughter, who is mesmerized by Sadko's singing and is in love with him. The hero is destined to visit many lands in his search of the bird. First shown in the USA in 1953 with English subtitles. This entry is for 1962 English-dub by Roger Corman's Filmgroup, which runs about 8 minutes shorter (removes much of the music) than the Russian original (see, Sadko, 1953)

Young Maxim grows up under the czarist regime with his grandparents as guardians. Continually demeaned by his martinet grandfather, Maxim is drawn to his warm-hearted grandmother, who instills in him the willingness to pursue his writing muse.

Followed by his two sons, Chuk and Gek, an engineer-explorer heads for a geologists'camp lost in the Ural white wilderness. He plans to spend New Year's Eve there with Chuk and Gek, among his fellow-colleagues. However an undetermined incident has caused the occupiers to leave the place. When, to their amazement, the three adventurers discover the empty camp, they realize that they don't have enough food to return immediately and that they will have to join forces to survive for a few days without any outside help...

Surreal Soviet fantasy movie about a man whose love is kidnapped by the Tsar and he must save her with the help of a humpbacked horse.

Second entry in Russian director Mark Donskoy's "Maxim Gorki" trilogy. Picking up where 1938's My Childhood left off, the story covers the years in Gorki's life when the future writer (Alexei Lyarsky) was on his own, looking for a purpose and place in life.

My Universities (Moi universiteti) is the last installment of Russian director Mark Donskoy's "Maxim Gorki" trilogy. Having endured a painful youth in My Childhood and a torturous sojourn as a serf in My Apprenticeship, future writer Gorki reaches maturity with an insatiable desire for personal and artistic freedom. The "university" of the title is actual the school of Hard Knocks, as Gorky goes to work in the shipyards and commisserates with the hard-drinking, philosophical dockworkers.

Episodic story of the resistance to the German invasion of the Ukraine in 1918 during World War 1, and made as an example of the guerrilla warfare and fierce spirit in which Ukrainian peasants were again resisting Teuton onslaughts in 1939. Highlights a small band of guerrillas and their battles using scythes, shotguns and, often, just clubs against the Kaiser's army in the Ukrainian forests.

The true story of one of Russia's most beloved national heroines. During the Nazi siege of Moscow, a fearless 18-year-old girl named Zoya risked her life as a partisan fighter. Captured by the Germans, Zoya endured unspeakable tortures at the hands of the Gestapo but still refused to betray her comrades. Even on the gallows, Zoya defiantly spoke out against the Nazis and everything they stood for. In a series of flashbacks, this film re-creates not merely Zoya's death, but also her life.

Growing up in a Ukrainian peasant family, knowing all hardships of serf life, young artist and poet Taras Shevchenko in the years of study clearly identifies the meaning of true art, which is to serve the interests of the people. The poems of Shevchenko are imbued with love for the common people. Fiery freedom-loving creativity of Taras Shevchenko is known throughout Russia. Nicholas I exiles the poet to the distant Caspian fort where he is to serve as an ordinary soldier and is banned from writing or drawing. In the poet's difficult days he has the support of Ukrainian soldier Skobelev, Polish revolutionary Sierakowski, captain Kosarev and the commandant of the fortress, Uskov. For the sake of his release Chernyshevsky and Dobrolyubov are hard at work. And so, the sick and aged Shevchenko is finally free. Together with Chernyshevsky and Dobrolyubov, he dreams of a bright future of the motherland, when the Russian and Ukrainian peoples throw off the chains of slavery.

A funny story about Mishka Strekachyov and his remarkable journey across the Soviet Union.

Set in the high North, this tale of a Russian teacher who begins to educate the children of the Chukchi tribe reinforces the director's firm belief in the power of education to overcome distrust and establish a shared civilizational foundation for all human beings.

Two look-alike boys, one a poor street kid and the other a prince, exchange places to see what the other's life is like.

The New Adventures of Schweik adopted to the WWII reality.

March-April

Based on Finnish mythology, this movie traces the exploits of Lemminkäinen as he woos the fair Annikki and battles the evil witch Louhi. Louhi kidnaps Annikki to compel her father to build for her a Sampo, a magical device that creates salt, grain, and gold. When Lemminkäinen tries (and fails) to recover the Sampo, Louhi steals the sun, plunging the world into frozen darkness.

Soviet film of the Shakespeare play.

Russian filmmaker Mark Donskoi, of "The Gorky Trilogy" fame, was responsible for the postwar Soviet drama The Taras Family (originally Nepokorenniye, and also released as Unvanquished and Unconquered). A semi-sequel to Donskoi's Raduga (1944), the story is set in Nazi-occupied Kiev. The drama focusses on the travails of a typical Soviet family and on the efforts by the Germans to force the reopening of a local munitions factory. The film is at its most grimly effective in a long sequence wherein the Nazis conduct a search for Jewish escapees, culminating in a horribly graphic re-creation of the slaughter of the Jews at Babi Yar. While Donskoi was critically lambasted for his cinematic "sloppyiness" during this sequence (hand-held camera, rapid cuts etc.), it can now be seen that he was attempting a realistic, documentarylike interpretation of this infamous Nazi atrocity.

Nesterka

Dangerous Trails

Film about the death of an old man, and the people that try to profit from his demise.

Chronicle of the life of Russian poet Michail Lermontov, from the final days of Alexandr Pushkin to the fatal destiny of the poet himself.

After the death of Bela, Pechorin was unwell for a long time, and then left the fortress and Maxim Maximych and left for Georgia. Since then, the headquarters captain had no news of his friend, often recalled and carefully carried his diaries in his wanderings. Five years have passed... Once at a post station near Vladikavkaz, Maxim Maximych with delight learns that Grigory Pechorin also came here. The long-awaited meeting brings an unbearable pain and bitterness of disappointment to the old warrior. In his hearts, he mercilessly parted with the travel notes of the ensign. And his random companion finds on the yellowed pages the story of the soul of an amazing, extraordinary person who brings misfortune to others all his life.

Incident on a Volcano

Antonina Vasilyevna, as a member of the bureau of the district committee of the party, was instructed to save the Leningrad children, whom the war overtook in the suburban camps. She took them to the Kirov region. After twelve days of hard travel, the children arrived in the village of Supryadki...

A drab woman scientist, working on machine to harness solar energy, and a pert concert singer look-alike being courted to play her in a movie swap identities and find personal growth, professional success, love, and happiness.

A never ending polar night reigns. The agitated residents of a village truns to a shaman but he won't help them. A brave young hunter goes in search for the sun.

Civil War. Southern steppes of Russia. Circumstances bring together various people: the Chekist, professor, actor, nurse and White Guard officer posing as a vet. On two tachanka's they make their way into the city.

In the fall of 1920, when the Red Army fought on the outskirts of Novorossiysk, one of the best ships of the Russian fleet “Oryol” stood at the berths of the port. The ship's boatswain, the hiding communist Mikhail Gruzdev, convinced Captain Chistyakov to keep the Eagle and return it to the red flag. Soon the legendary ship aboard the White Guards pursued by the Red Army left Novorossiysk. History left no trace of the further fate of the "Eagle" and its crew. It was believed that Chistyakov handed over the ship to the White Guards, and they took him abroad. Many years later, the captain of the ship “Flounder” Mikhail Gruzdev, confident in Chistyakov’s uncompromising attitude, obtained permission - and set about searching for the missing ship.

Having been wounded during the exercises, the sailor Fedos Chizhik is sent as a orderly to the house of Captain Luzgin. The captain's wife - a young, beautiful, and spoiled woman - is very hard on the orderly.

Брат героя

The story that happened on the farm near Dikanka on the night before Christmas, when the village blacksmith Vakula, having saddled the Devil, brought to his beloved Oksana, the daughter of a rich Cossack Chub, queen's "сherevichki"(the little women shoes) from the capital — St. Petersburg.

Pilot Losev, who lost his family during the war, learns that his daughter Aurika was saved during the bombing, and sets off in search of her. The former pilot will survive many fates and stories before a familiar chorus of a lullaby helps him to recognize his daughter in a random fellow traveler.

Based on the play of the same name by Leonid Leonov. The famous singer Ladygin, who has won success and fame, lives in a spacious apartment furnished with paintings and luxury goods. Suddenly, an old front-line friend, a prominent scientist Svekolkin, comes to Ladygin. Realizing that for Ladygin, ranks and titles are more valuable than human qualities, Svekolkin tells his friend that he works as a simple cashier. This leads to a number of misunderstandings and comic situations...

A funny comedy about a kindergarten manager who tries to make all the preparations before the start of a school year.

The story of a brave Chukchi boy Sarmiko which was carried away on an ice floe into the open sea.

Early 50s. Frosts, unusual for the Black Sea coast, scathered orange trees used for breeding new varieties at the experimental botanical station. There is only one specimen left, and there is nothing to pollinate it with.

Швейк готовится к бою

Завтрак у предводителя

Artyomka’ Adventures

A funny story about a life of a big department store and its employees and customers.

Боевой киносборник №1