This short animation is rather interesting. In comparison to other Russian animation it feels far less artistic. But it is effective in what it tries to do. It is obviously a critique of hard work and mindless obedience and it shows it's point marvelously. The visuals and soundtrack are also very surreal and go well to expose the absurdity of the situation.
2 Reviews
Style over substance
Horst_In_Translation26 July 2016
Warning: Spoilers
"Zhil-byl Kozyavin" or "There lived Kozyavin" is a 9-5-minute cartoon from the Soviet Union. This one was made in 1966, so it has its 50th anniversary this year. And I must say it has not aged well at all really. The beginning was okay still, but then the makers behind this movie got lost in absurd animation techniques instead of focusing on the title character and telling a convincing story about him. The result of all this was that the film drags occasionally despite not even running for under 10 minutes and at the end I really couldn't care less who Kozyavin was or what happened to him. Pretty disappointed here in the work by director Andrey Khrzhanovskiy and writers Lazar Lagin, Gennady Shpalikov, especially the latter two. Luckily, this film is relatively short, because if it had run for another 10 minutes, I probably would have given an even lower rating. Not recommended.
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