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Propala hramota (1972)
Best Ukrainian movie ever made (but to understand that, you have to be Ukrainian)
It is hard to exaggerate the value of "The Lost Letter" - in some way it catched the inner spirit of Ukrainian culture and resonate with the souls of Ukrainian viewers on a deepest level. That's the reason why this movie is a mindcracker for foreigners but almost every Ukrainian loves it and understands most of hidden metaphors without any explanation.
Considering this, i'll try to shed a little light on some of non-obvious nuances that should help non-ukrainians to understand this masterpiece a little bit more.
The plot is pretty simple - movie tells us a folk comedy story (which follows Gogol's novel, but not very thoroughly) of Vasyl and Andrij - two cossacks who make bizarre journey in attempt to deliver a letter from Hetman (cossack military leader) to the Queen (russian empress) in Petersburg and their return to their native village afterwards. Sounds not so complicated, but to understand what that journey means is a very hard task, because creators of the movie put deep allegories almost in every detail of the film.
First of all, to understand the setting, you should know the history of Ukraine and its relations with the Russian Empire in cossack period, as it establishes in Ukrainian National Mythos. According to that, Ukraine of 16-17 centuries was warring land full of calm provincial villages with fierce warriors that lived ordinary life, while was not in war campains against muslim Turkey and their vassals. The life of common folk was pretty simple and not used to the rigid rules of court etiquette, ball dresses and white wigs. So the journey to heavily German and France influenced russian capital was a journey to almost another world, most would even not believe that such thing as Petersburg is even real enough, at least not as the travellers will describe it. And so there is a first layer of journey.
The second is a spiritual one - its even harder to explain than the previous. Lets start from the statement that foreign land is different, oddly surreal - then in a mindset of a common Ukrainian villager it must be somehow connected with the diabolical spirits (which are always somewhere around). And I use the worlds "diabolical spirits" because its very hard to explain the real role of underworld and demons in ukrainian folklore, which is just the "other" force, different, uncommon - but not inevitably evil, as in west-european world. The devil and his companions always try to steal and entrap your soul, but thats their nature - mean people that betray The Faith (christianity) or harm their neighbours are far, far more evil than even The Satan himself. The Cossack, on a contrary, is quite the opposite in ukrainian mindset - the champion of truth and The Faith, glorious defender of weak and poor but a trickster and bon-vivant as well. Ad so, the journey of Vasyl and Andrij somehow takes place in a spiritual realm - its the journey through strangely connected devil's plans to dishonor the overall cossack pride and dignity by hampering the attempt of delivery the important letter or even trapping Vasyl's soul. Devil and his minions tries many times, but cossack prowess fascinates even one of devils minions - "good demon" Kuts, proving the superiority of virtue over most elaborate mind-tricking.
The third and most important layer of symbolism is metaphor of Ukraine's fate as a nation. The period, which is described in a movie, is the reign of Catherine II as russian empress (who eventually destroyed the heart of a cossack movement - fortress-city of Sich). Its the time when other people commanded Ukrainians what to do and how to live. In the reality of the movie cossack Vasyl is a legend - excellent fighter, unconquered and loyal to The Cause - the one, whose time is closing its end under the pressure of necessities to find a good place in a new world such as find a good servitude or buy a good position for oneself. This is portrayed by the woman that asks Vasyl for a place of servitude near the Queen for her young sibling. The final moment - when Vasyl gives a horse and his hat for that boy, telling him that his fate is to be free as he wanted to be and the only servitude worth to be done is a servitude to his People - that moment is crucial for reinstaitment the prevalence of Truth over the False after the supposed victory of devil's forces in the Queen's palace. Vasyl's message to the young boy corellates heavily with the higher idea of freedom in Ukrainian mindset and even more - there is a hidden message for independance of Ukraine from others, who want to chain it with the foreign influence by bureaucracy, promises of payment and protection. It is worth reminding that the movie was shot in a period of total Soviet domination over Ukraine, when any discussion about the national idea and heroic figures of pre-soviet Ukraine's past was immediately banned and all media was meticulously checked for censoring all mentions of it. That (with the fact that cossacks in a movie have no admiration towards the russian reign) was the reason the film wasn't allowed for the big screens for 12 years even after it was lightly corrected due to censorship of art comittee in Moscow.
This list could go on and on - as i said earlier, authors sow a cultural subtext almost in every movie detail, but my task was to show most important layers, and if you have read this far - I hope now you understand why I believe that this movie catched the spirit of Ukrainian nation.
Oleksa Dovbush (1960)
A brilliant from soviet era of ukrainian cinematography
It is rarely that movie could make such a strong effect - in case of "Oleksa Dovbush" it was a revival of all region of Western Ukraine - at least in culture. Sometimes the strength of the movies that caused such dramatic changes are just in ideology, but "Oleksa Dovbush" will surprise you here again - it's a strong historical action-adventure movie with astounding directing, scening, and camera work.
The movie setting is 18 century noth-eastern Carpathian mountains, where live one of the most archaic ukrainian tribes - hutsuls, which at these times are under despotic polish rule. The story tells us about emergence of small but effective resistance group led by a man named Oleksa Dovbush, which acted in a Robin Hood-manner against the opression of polish nobles. Almost at the beginning we got a magnificent 'gathering the troop' scene with introduction of all different characters in Dovbush's squad and astonishing mountain view at the background. Also this scene introduce us to the romantic plotline - Oleksa's love Marichka, who he must reject to live a dangerous but chivalrous life of opryshko - mountain robber - scourge of a wealth-hungry landlords and protector of common folk.
Being the leader of the band, Oleksa uses his wits, courage and cunning to trick the larger forces of polish nobility time after time. As the story goes we see how successes of a little group give rise to a country-wide rebellion, to pacify which polish nobles must send considerable army. But even that is not enough to catch elusive opryshko, so nobles descend to the most despicable ways just to get rid of him...
As an action movie this film have great scenes of fights and chases, although there are plenty dramatic tension scenes too. Almost every one of them is filled with depiction of ethnic customs, beautiful landscapes and dramatic music. Overall tone may sometimes be too much in gloryfying rich/poor antagonism - but hey, its soviet film. Every movie in USSR must had class struggle in their narrative.
As for minuses - there is strange cut in the middle. It seems this is the result of censoring, so it's most likely not the fault of filmmakers. After all, the movie was made in 1959 - Khrushchev's rule, when censorship in cinema was a little less menacing than in Stalin times, but still pretty strict. And just BTW - this was a second attempt to make the film - first one, based on the same script and directed in 1941 by Ivan Kavaleridze, failed to continue shooting process due to the WWII.
Sikandar (1941)
Indian view on well-known story
As there was no rewiew here, I think it would be good to put some words about this quite unusual movie.
First of all - I saw this movie with subtitles, since i couldn't find voiced version. With a rare movies from 'talkies' era like this it's quite common. At some moments i had the feeling that subtitles may be more or less incomplete and did not reveal all details of sophisticated language, but still i found dialogues interesting and the overall story was easy to understand.
The movie focuses on indian campaign of Alexander the Great, and depicts it more from indian perspective - meaning at some point we can see Alexander more like invader and king Porus like idealised protector of homeland. From the very beginning we see impressive decorations of palace settings - I was very surprised to see such good depiction of foreign costumes in an indian movie (although in closer look a nimble eye can see fakeness of all greek armors). Visuals are the stongest side of the movie - although camera work isn't so impressive and sometimes diminishes the aestetic effectiveness of scenery. Battle scenes in movie - they are different... Sometimes depiction is nominal and sometimes we can see an elephant charge through infantry made without any special effects - absolutly mindblowing!
Although the story is not very complicated, the movie has very slow pace. Some simple dialogue scenes are more several minutes long. Its good to show character's deepest motivations, but in the middle of the film we know motivations of every character quite well - and neverthenless movie has this slow temp to the end.
Few words about characters - there is some very distinct and interesting ones. Alexandr is depicted always optimistic and joyful neverlosing young conqueror - pretty realistic in my opinion. Rukhsana is just adorable in her youth and passion. Aristotle showed here very astere and cold but later we see, that there is still humanity beneath logics of the wise. And of course Porus - an idealized near-chakravarti (ideal ruler in buddhism) in this movie, still has a stong bit of charm in his all-about-virtues attitude of mind.
What an indian movie without songs? There is some (not too much), and they are pretty lovely, although one song choice still make me scratch my head - a greek soldiers, singing 'Life is all about love' while marching on conquest? That must be some bad translation or maybe here comes that long expected cultural difference?..