Russian Cinema
Early films from the then Soviet Union had a shaky start due to the First World War and the October Revolution in 1917, but Lenin himself and later Stalin recognised the propaganda uses of the medium. At first, with the infrastructure in tatters and virtually no cinemas in which to screen films, shorts expounding communism were carried from place to place often accompanying live speakers. Once Moscow's first cinema was opened at the end of 1921, newsreels became common. But in 1924 Sergei Eisenstein's 'Strike' became the first true Soviet feature. The following year his 'Battleship Potemkin' was launched to great acclaim, highly propagandistic and towing the party line.
Tight restrictions on content continued up until Stalin's death in 1953 and it wasn't until the '60s and '70s that seminal Russian film makers like Andrei Tarkovsky, Sergo Paradjanov and Nikita Mikhalkov began to find their own voice.
With the collapse of the Soviet Union, the largely state-funded film industry all but disappeared and is only now beginning to find its feet once more. A few gems found their way to Alice's shelves from this period, such as 'Burnt By The Sun' (1994), 'Prisoner of the Mountains' (1996), and our one and only Estonian film is to be found in this section, for want of a better home, the darkly humourous 'Darkness in Tallinn' (1993). 2002 saw the release of 'Russian Ark' (pictured), shot in one take, it is the longest unedited film ever made.
Greed (1925)
7.9/10
Director: Erich Von Stroheim
Starring: Gibson Gowland, Zasu Pitts, Jean Hersholt
One of the wonders of film, this miracle of filmmaking made against the most impossible of odds, stars Gibson Gowland as a dentist who marries the dau... Read more
Hard to Be a God (2013)
6.7/10
Director: Aleksei German
Starring: Leonid Yarmolnik, Yuriy Tsurilo, Natalia Moteva, Aleksandr Chutko
Aleksey German directs this Russian-language sci-fi drama following the journey of a group of scientists who have been selected to travel to another p... Read more
Hard to Be a God (Blu-ray) (2013)
6.6/10
Director: Aleksei German
Starring: Leonid Yarmolnik, Yuriy Tsurilo, Natalia Moteva, Aleksandr Chutko
Aleksey German directs this Russian-language sci-fi drama following the journey of a group of scientists who have been selected to travel to another p... Read more
Hardcore Henry (2015)
6.7/10
Director: Ilya Naishuller
Starring: Tim Roth, Haley Bennett, Sharlto Copley, Danila Kozlovsky, Andrei Dementiev
A man wakes up in a Moscow laboratory to learn that he's been brought back from the dead as a half-human, half-robotic hybrid. With no memory of his f... Read more
House of Fools (2002)
7.2/10
Director: Andrei Konchalovsky
Starring: Yuliya Vysotskaya, Sultan Islamov, Stanislav Varkki, Vladas Bagdonas, Bryan Adam...
Based on a true story, this offbeat Russian drama concerns a mental hospital on the border of Chechnya and its assortment of eccentrics. When the arri... Read more
How I Ended This Summer (2011)
7/10
Director: Alexei Popogrebsky
Starring: Grigory Dobrygin, Sergei Puskepalis
Set against the spectacular, otherworldly landscape of the windswept Arctic Circle, writer/director Alexei Popogrebsky's multi-award winning psycholog... Read more
I Am Cuba (1964)
8/10
Director: Mikhail Kalatozov
Unseen by the West for nearly 30 years, this unusual Cuban/Soviet co-production was meant to help train Cuban filmmakers and build support for Castro'... Read more
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In Bloom (2013)
7.7/10
Director: Nana Ekvtimishvili, Simon Groß
Starring: Lika Babluani, Mariam Bokeria, Zurab Gogaladze
Set in the Georgian capital of Tbilisi in 1992. Friends Eka and Natia look to leave childhood behind as they ignore societal customs and work to escap... Read more
In the Fog (2012)
6.8/10
Director: Sergei Loznitsa
In 1942, Belarus is in the hands of Nazis and the local militia. Sushenya is taken from his house in the middle of the night by Burov and his sidekick... Read more
Iron Fury (T-34) (2018)
6.5/10
The Great Patriotic War is going on. Junior Lieutenant Nikolay Ivushkin in a small truck, along with the driver Vasya, barely survived, break away fro... Read more