The Russian Woolf

2018 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 546-567
Author(s):  
Ira Nadel
Keyword(s):  
Virginia Woolf ◽  
Sergei Eisenstein ◽  
Ballets Russes ◽  
Russian Film ◽  
Russian Cinema

Virginia Woolf and Russia has been examined but not fully studied. Entirely overlooked has been her response to Russian cinema and dance, particularly the Ballets Russes. This paper addresses that gap through an account of Woolf's response to, and interest in, both Russian film and dance, while also accounting for how she incorporates her admiration of Dostoevsky, Turgenev and other Russian writers into her work. Her study and translations with the Russian Jewish émigré Samuel Koteliansky, a formative influence on her continuing absorption with matters Russian, is also analyzed, as well as the importance of Russian cinematic techniques, notably sound, drawn in part from such Russian directors as V. I. Pudovkin, as well as montage, originating with Lev Kuleshov and Sergei Eisenstein.

Introduction

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vlad Strukov
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Changes ◽  
Film Studios ◽  
Way Of Thinking ◽  
Russian Film ◽  
Russian Cinema ◽  
Film Market ◽  
New Generation ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Mode A

I start by providing an overview of the major social, political and cultural changes that have occurred in Russia since Putin’s coming to power in 2000 and the Bolotnaya 2011 protests. I discuss Russian film market and industry, focussing on the emergence of new practices and a new generation of filmmakers. I zoom into particular film studios that have been responsible for the production of the most successful films and provide an overview of existing research on the Russian cinema of the period. I outline the methodological parameters and objectives of my research. I introduce the concept of the symbolic mode and explore the relationship between the symbolic mode and the ‘native’ traditions of representation. I consider the symbolic mode a critique of film semiology, polemicizing with mimetic theories and re-visiting poststructuralist thought concerning semiotics / signification. I argue the symbolic mode suggests a move away from the concerns of identity representations towards the problem of subjectivity construction. I introduce Badiou’s concept of film as a way of thinking and I identify how the film chapters develop the argument, pointing out that relevant concepts will be introduced in the film chapters.

Russian Film Comedy

2020 ◽  
pp. 187-210
Author(s):  
William V. Costanzo
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Sergei Eisenstein ◽  
Russian Film ◽  
Repressive Regime ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Film Comedy

Soviet and Russian cinemas offer unique opportunities to investigate the role of humor as an escape from oppression and an instrument for change. This chapter follows the nation’s filmmakers from the idealistic days of revolution (Lev Kuleshov, Sergei Eisenstein, Aleksandr Medvedkin), through Stalin’s repressive regime (Grigory Aleksandrov and Ivan Pyrev) and the chills and thaws of the Cold War (Eldar Ryazanov, Leonid Gaidai, Tengiz Abuladze). It introduces lesser-known talents who made films before (Yevgeny Bauer, Boris Barnet) and after (Yuri Mamin, Kira Muratova, Valery Todorovskiy) the Soviet era. In their own ways, each of these directors contributed to a comic cinema that builds on the ironic sensibility of Chekhov, the satiric caricatures of Gogol, and the archetypes of Russia’s native folklore.

Conclusion

2020 ◽  
pp. 235-246
Author(s):  
David Trotter
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Signal To Noise Ratio ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Signal To Noise ◽  
Sergei Eisenstein ◽  
British Poetry ◽  
Architectural Feature ◽  
Russian Film ◽  
Political Solidarity ◽  
Influential Theory

This chapter offers a brief recapitulation of what has been learnt by approaching British and other literatures of the period 1850 to 1950 from the perspective of the ideas of signal and interface. It concludes that, while the pressure these ideas exerted did indeed remain constant throughout the period, it took an eccentric emphasis on aspects of form to reconfigure the text itself as a manipulation of signal-to-noise ratio. The ‘modernism’ which took shape in works by Lewis, Loy, and Mirrlees was a specialist affair. The chapter concludes with two further case studies. The first has to do with the function of a particular architectural feature—the corridor—in nineteenth-century British poetry and fiction; the second with the hugely influential theory and practice of the Russian film director Sergei Eisenstein, who thought that political solidarity was best expressed by means of what we would now term ‘social media’.

The Eisenstein-Vygotsky-Luria Collaboration

Projections ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 23-44 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julia Vassilieva
Keyword(s):  
Crucial Role ◽  
Cultural Psychology ◽  
Film Theory ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Functional Architecture ◽  
Cultural Mediation ◽  
Sergei Eisenstein ◽  
Lev Vygotsky ◽  
Russian Film ◽  
The Brain

This article analyzes the unique historical collaboration between the revolutionary Russian film director Sergei Eisenstein (1898–1948), the cultural psychologist Lev Vygotsky (1896–1934), and the founder of contemporary neuropsychology, Alexander Luria (1902–1977). Vygotsky’s legacy is associated primarily with the idea that cultural mediation plays a crucial role in the emergence and development of personality and cognition. His collaborator, Luria, laid the foundations of contemporary neuropsychology and demonstrated that cultural mediation also changes the functional architecture of the brain. In my analysis, I demonstrate how the Eisenstein-Vygotsky-Luria collaboration exemplifies a strategy of productive triangulation that harnesses three disciplinary perspectives: those of cultural psychology, neuropsychology, and film theory and practice.

Methodological aspects of studying the history of Soviet cinema in the 1930s

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 17-28
Author(s):  
Sultan I. Usuvaliev
Keyword(s):  
Film Studies ◽  
Early Stage ◽  
Film History ◽  
Soviet History ◽  
Soviet Film ◽  
Soviet Cinema ◽  
History Of ◽  
Russian Film ◽  
Russian Cinema ◽  
Methodological Aspects

The article is devoted to the history of the Russian film studies and methodology of film history as science using the example of the Introduction of History of the Soviet Film Art by Nikolai Iezuitov (18991941), one of the founders of the national film studies. Since the manuscript of History of the Soviet Film Art the first history of the Soviet cinema has not yet been published and introduced into scholarly use, the author pays special attention to archival sources. Despite a number of essays and discussions about film history and its methodology, a fundamental scholarly work on the historiography of the history of Soviet and Russian cinema has not yet been written. The relevance and novelty of the article is that it is based on the study of archival manuscripts of Nikolai Iezuitov. The exploration of early approaches to the study of the history of the Soviet cinema is important both historically and pedagogically. One of the most important sources of the concept of film history at an early stage of the national film studies is Iezuitov's Introduction to History of the Soviet Film Art. The Introduction is valuable because: 1) it is a rare evidence of reflection on the foundations of film history as scholarship and its methodology; 2) it is given by the author of the first history of the Soviet cinema; 3) it is represented by the author not as a separate abstract essay but as a part of the history itself. The Introduction defines the scholarly tasks and content of film history; overviews foreign books on the history of cinema; emphasizes specific periods of Soviet film history; and indicates the principles of work with relevant sources. Iezuitovs main principles in relation to film history are established in connection, firstly, with Soviet history scholarship; and secondly, with the vision of film history as the history of film art. Thus, film history, according to Iezuitov, is the unity of Marxist understanding of history and art-historical (stylistic) analysis of films and the main film movements in Soviet cinema.

scholarly journals Synthesis of National and Transnational in A. Konchalovsky's American Movies

2015 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 52-60
Author(s):  
Grigoriy Igorevich Kurdiaev
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Film Industry ◽  
The United States ◽  
International Strategy ◽  
Film Festivals ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
San Sebastian ◽  
Russian Film ◽  
Russian Cinema ◽  
First Time

In September 2014 Andrey Konchalovskiy's White Nights of Postman Alexey Tryapitsyn won Silver Lion for the Best Director at the Venice Film Festival. European critics and advanced public have regularly marked endowments of the Soviet and Russian film director. Throughout his career he has received numerous awards at prestigious European film festivals. There are Crystal Globe in Karlovy Vary for the Romance for Lovers (1974), Grand Prix at Cannes for Sibiriada (1979), the main prizes of San Sebastian for Uncle Vanya (1971) and Homer and Eddie (1989). Meanwhile, Konchalovsky's success among American mass audience and critics has been much more modest, though Andrey Konchalovsky was the first in the early 1980s, since the time of the first wave of Russian 1910-20's emigration, who attempted to connect deeply national, Russian spirit with Hollywood production technology-oriented international strategy in his works. Being established in the Soviet Union as an esteemed author, Konchalovskiy decided to change the film industry to start over his career. Nowadays, in the context of the festival success in the European and Soviet/Russian cinema circles and the lack of attention in the United States, a question arises, if one can consider this attempt as successful one. In this article the author tries identify Russian national motives, which the filmmaker has introduced into Hollywood culture through his creative method, and those originally Hollywood themes and topics that have appeared for the first time in the works of the recognized Soviet director. Basing on Konchalovskys American works the author tries to elicit creative value in their national and transnational synthesis and expose the extent of their productivity and sensemaking.

scholarly journals Artistic Merit as a Russian Film Competitiveness Factor

2010 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
pp. 90-112
Author(s):  
Olga Petrovna Ziborova
Keyword(s):  
Data Base ◽  
Home Market ◽  
Sociological Analysis ◽  
Medium Term ◽  
Research Project ◽  
Private Companies ◽  
Russian Film ◽  
Russian Cinema ◽  
Governmental Institutions ◽  
Practical Recommendations

The present investigation was held within the framework of the research project "Russian Film Competitiveness" commissioned by the RF Ministry of Culture (supervised by M.I. Zhabsky, Ph. D in Sociology). The project's aim was to make a complex (economic, artistic and sociological) analysis of Russian cinema competitiveness factors in the home market, to work out practical recommendations to governmental institutions and private companies for raising the competitive capacity of Russian films, to create the methods of the audience's demand monitoring and form a data base for medium-term forecasting

The Storming of the Winter Palace as a Mythmaking of National Screen Culture

2017 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 24-36
Author(s):  
Sergey N Ilchenko
Keyword(s):  
Real Life ◽  
Main Idea ◽  
Russian Revolution ◽  
Soviet Period ◽  
Winter Storm ◽  
Sergei Eisenstein ◽  
History Of ◽  
Russian Cinema ◽  
Key Events ◽  
The Impact

The article analyzes the problems of cinematic authenticity of one of the key events of Russian history of the 20th century - that is the storming of the Winter Palace in Petrograd in autumn 1917. The interpretation of this event of the Great Russian revolution in the author's opinion is a good example to demonstrate the formation of the mythology of the Story, which was one of the meanings of types of screen culture of the Soviet period. The author examines classics of Russian cinema dedicated to the events of 1917 in Petrograd. The study focuses upon three films - October by Sergei Eisenstein (1927), Lenin in October by Michael Romm (1937) and I saw the birth of a new world (2nd part of the novels Red bells, 1982) by Sergei Bondarchuk. Each of the three films is considered as a stage of formation of the image of the fake key events of October 1917. The author reveals the mechanism of formation of the onscreen Canon, which, since the film of Eisenstein, has been perceived as the only possible feature version of the event. Following the task, the author compares subsequent versions of Romm and Bondarchuk's October and concludes that they somehow had at its core thematic and visual concept of an image of the events specified by Eisenstein. The article demonstrates how a combination of different factors, which in the final versions of the films by Eisenstein, Romm, and Bondarchuk has led to the fact that the display concept of the episode "Winter Storm" when in each of them though differed in the details and the circumstances from the origin, coincide in the main idea of the assault on the rebels of the revolutionary masses. Discussing the impact of the three classic films on the related and subsequent films devoted to the events of 1917, the author comes to the conclusion that in the current cinema the visual Canon of interpretation has a strong mythological style, which is at odds with the facts of documentary evidence and confirmation, which are in opposition to the established due to the cinema version. This allows to identify the on-screen episodes analyzed as a complex historical fake, which has obtained a pseudo-real life on screen.

scholarly journals “Moscow text” in Russian cinema in the 1920s-1940s

2014 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 23-32
Author(s):  
Nina Alexandrovna Boyarshinova
Keyword(s):  
Free Space ◽  
Film Studies ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Warm Hospitality ◽  
Female Protagonist ◽  
City Culture ◽  
Russian Film ◽  
Russian Cinema ◽  
New Babylon

In the article the Russian films of the period 1920-1940 are considered, the image of Moscow is analyzed in the context of the concept of city text. The concept city text sprang into being as a certain sample of the supra text concept, a complex set of semantically bound texts. This issue is underexplored in the Russian film studies. The urgency of the investigation is stipulated by the fact, that under cultural dissimilation reflection of the separate text integrity, the capitals cityscape expressed in cinema terms in particular, will contribute to the perception of ways of urbanization on socio-cultural level as well as peculiarities of city culture shaping Three concepts of Moscow are specified: Moscow as a Third Rome, with prevaing symbols of power, Moscow as a new Kitezh with bi-worldness images, and Moscow as a new Babylon paralleling the Russian capital with the Bible city. Also such concepts as Moscow as a female protagonist and festive Moscow, rendering the mood of warm hospitality, friendship and cordiality are considered. Different manifestations of all three concepts are displayed in the 1920-s cinema: novelized images of Moscow as a reborn symbol of power, as a two-layered city and as a new Babylon. In the 1930-s the capital in the cinema is represented by comedies, showing Moscow as a dream-city, where all wishes come true, as a conflict-free space with the female protagonist delivering the key semantics of festive Moscow. In the 1940-s the continuation of the previous years tendency is traced - the war themes dont emerge, but the idea of dream city is still popular, elaborated by the ideas of power and domination, materialized in the images of the parades. Next decades the idea of the Moscow as a dream city will be changed, but the power of its influence will reveal itself, whereas the idea of bi-worldness starts to develop in completely different facets.

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