The End of St. Petersburg 1927
Shortly before the outbreak of WWI, a peasant from rural Russia arrives in St. Petersburg to find work.
Shortly before the outbreak of WWI, a peasant from rural Russia arrives in St. Petersburg to find work.
A Soviet woman is caught between her husband and son, who find themselves on opposing sides of the Russian Revolution.
As she works in her tedious office job, Maria Ivanovna dreams about being married, and she has particular hopes that her co-worker Nikodim Mityushin will take an interest in her. Nikodim, though, is in love with Zina, who sells cigarettes on the sidewalk, and he frequently buys cigarettes from her even though he does not smoke. One day, a film crew uses Zina as an extra in an outdoor scene, and the cameraman, Latugin, falls in love with her. Latugin soon arranges an acting job for Zina. To complicate matters further, Zina has yet another admirer in Oliver MacBride, an American businessman who is visiting Moscow.
A young Soviet woman struggles to cope in a society obsessed with chess.
The spread of the Soviet revolution drives the blood sucking international capitalists to desperation, so they take their wealth and fly off into space, but even then cannot escape the wrath of the wronged workers.
A Moscow hat shop girl chances upon a penniless young man who has arrived from the countryside for university and takes pity on him.
Jacob, a farmer, returns from the war to his wife Marie and begs the landlord baron for a plot of land to rent. The Baron grants the request, but only for a barren, rocky, useless acreage. The pair struggle to make do on this land, but then the Baron demands that Maria leave her husband to serve as wet nurse to his married daughter Anya's new baby, on threat of eviction. While nursing the daughter's baby, Maria receives unwelcome attentions from the daughter's husband, and a scandal erupts, ruining Maria in her husband's eyes. When she escapes from her employers and seeks to return home, the police give her the yellow passport signifying a prostitute, further degrading her. She approaches home, unsure of the reception that awaits her.
A young woman sharpshooter fighting with the Reds in Turkestan misses her forty-first victim, a handsome White lieutenant, and ends up escorting him, by boat, into captivity across the Aral Sea. A storm strands the two on an island.
Goga is a Russian man who has no luck with women. He has a chance meeting with Mary Pickford, and after she kisses him on the cheek, he becomes as irresistible as her.
Three reporters and an office girl are trying to stop a bacteriological strike by some powerful western business leaders against the USSR.
Konstantin Eggert both directed and starred as Count Shemet, cursed by his insane mother’s traumatic experience with a bear to have seizures during which he himself becomes a “bear” on the kill.
A group of children goes to the toy museum and then toy workshop. The master makes Bolvashka - a wooden Pinocchio-like boy on hinges. Upon returning, children tell their friends about the museum and dream of Bolvashka being alive.
Billed as "a cinema-propaganda poster," this 1927 short advocates the purchase of government bonds as a means to combat a British trade embargo. Its dynamic interpolation of newsreel footage and animation is a good deal more radical than its political message.
"Though not given a New York showing until 1935, V. I. Pudovkin's Mechanics of the Brain (Mekhanika Golovnovo Mozga) was written and directed by Pudovkin in 1926. A full year in the making, this scientific documentary concentrates on the behavioral studies conducted by Prof. Ivan Pavlov. The laboratory dogs used in Pavlov's research don't seem too happy about it, and as a result this film might be hard to take for the more sensitive viewers (the vivisection sequence is particularly rough). The progress of the research is detailed with charts and graphs, hardly the "cinematic" touches one might expect from Pudovkin. Interestingly, Mechanics of the Brains was released two years before the results of Pavlov's studies were printed in book form."
October reflects a general attempt in Russia to sustain the frenzy and dynamism of revolutionary fervour. This attempt increased in scale and ambition as they pushed it further, resulting in the theatricalisation of life. In other words, the boundaries between real events and fabricated drama became blurred as the portrayal of life became more exaggerated. It is important to remember that the film does not represent what actually happened during the 1917 Revolution, but is rather an adaptation.
A small town postal official allows a military officer to take his lovely daughter away to St. Petersburg, assuming the man will do the right thing and marry her.Instead, a future of scandal and tragedy await her.
The main protagonists of the film are Katya (Varvara Popova), the daughter of a factory worker and Andrey (Ivan Koval-Samborsky), the son of the former owner of the factory who illegally returns to the USSR to find treasures hidden by his father. The film title refers to the Communist party's appeal, after Lenin's death, to enlarge its membership.
1918 Odessa. German occupiers plunder the city. Sailor Petrus, who has lagged behind the Red Army detachment, saves one of the victims of bandit terror - the girl Marusya... Years have passed. The time has come for peaceful construction in the country. Red commander Petrus and Marusya, who has become a teacher, meet in Moscow in one of the cafes, where both were attracted by the sounds of the popular song “Eh, apple...”, accompanying the adventure of the heroes.
About life and customs in the boyar environment during the reign of Peter I.