bad politics / chapter 03 ~COMMUNISM
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- DirectorVsevolod PudovkinStarsVera BaranovskayaNikolay BatalovAleksandr ChistyakovA story about a family torn apart by a worker's strike. At first, the mother wants to protect her family from the troublemakers, but eventually she realizes that her son is right and the workers should strike.
- DirectorEsfir ShubStarsMikhail AlekseyevAlexei BrusilovNikolai ChkheidzeIn May 1913 the Romanov Dynasty celebrates its 300th anniversary at the Russian throne. The last emperor in the long line is Tsar Nicholas II. He rules over a country with huge social and economic differences. Russia is for the most part still an agrarian society, but capitalism and its industries are growing. In 1914 Russia gets involved in the First World War. Tsar Nicholas II declares a general mobilization. A vast number of peasants and workers have to go to the front as soldiers. After three years the country is ruined by the war, and there is a shortage of provisions. In February 1917 workers begin striking in the capital, Petrograd. Their protests are soon joined by soldiers. A complete anarchy is threatening the country, when the parliament, called the duma, reorganizes the power structure by forming a new Provisional Government. At the same time the Soviet of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies forms another ruling body at the City Hall of Petrograd. In this situation Tsar Nicholas II sees no other possibility than to resign from his government. On the 4th of March 1917 he declares his abdication from the throne. The new Provisional Government and its war minister Kerensky continue the war. This presents an opportunity for the Bolsheviks to organize demonstrations and to persuade the workers and soldiers to overthrow the Provisional Government and seize power themselves.
- DirectorGrigoriy KozintsevLeonid TraubergStarsDavid GutmanYelena KuzminaAndrei KostrichkinIn the beginning of the industrial revolution, the Paris Commune was established in 1871 against the rich and the powerful, and violently repressed by the army that remained faithful to a tamer form of Republicanism. How could the love story between a young sales girl and a soldier unable to decide if he was pro or against the radical fashion? Two short months were needed for the answer to be found - in blood and tears, and under rain that washes all past memories. Any day, a New Babylon shop will open with frilly things for the bourgeois girls. The washerwomen will be there to wash them.
- DirectorKurt MaetzigStarsGünther SimonHans-Peter MinettiErich FranzThis historical-biographical film begins in the first days of November 1918 on the western front. News comes to the soldiers of a revolutionary uprising in Kiel. Young Thälmann, a soldier against his will, would like to join the expanding conflict on the side of his comrades in Hamburg. As the revolution becomes threatened by the betrayal of the right-wing Social Democrats and the splintering of the working class, he nevertheless tries unremittingly to unite the workers. The reactionaries grow ever stronger and the neediness of ordinary people multiplies. In this dire situation, the Hamburg police commissioner would like to block the unloading of a ship full of provisions that were sent from Petrograd as a message of solidarity. But Thälmann prevails in unloading it. The high point and conclusion of the first part of the Thälmann films is established at the Hamburg Uprising in October 1923.
- DirectorKurt MaetzigStarsGünther SimonHans-Peter MinettiKarla RunkehlThe second part of the Ernst Thälmann films encompasses the time period between 1930 and Thälmann's murder in 1944. It shows Thälmann's battle to achieve a united front with all German workers against the National Socialists, his arrest following Hitler's seizure of power and the eleven years of his incarceration, in which he is unwavering in his beliefs until his death. An attempt to free him on the part of his comrades ends disastrously, and a corrupt offer of freedom from Göring himself receives Thälmann's refusal. He must also witness how his brave fellow Socialist Aenne Jansen in the women's prison across from his tragically loses her life during a bombing raid. The second primary character of the film is Aenne's husband Fiete Jansen, who already proved his loyalty to Thälmann's side as a friend and fighter in the first part. As the commander of the Thälmann Battalion, he fights in Spain on the side of the people and later in the ranks of the Red Army toward a speedy end to the war against Fascism.
- DirectorPeter WatkinsStarsMichael RoyJohn NewingStan MercerAn amateur short film which retells the Hungarian revolution of 1956.
- DirectorAgnès VardaStarsMichel PiccoliJuan AlmeidaAlejo CarpentierA photo montage of Cubans filmed by Agnes Varda during her visit to Cuba in 1963. The film explores Cuban society and culture post-revolution.
- DirectorKarel VachekStarsAlexander DubcekAntonín NovotnýLudvík SvobodaThe film captures the excited political atmosphere in March 1968 Czechoslovakia when president Antonin Novotny stepped down and Ludvik Svoboda was elected a new president. The then top political figures are filmed during their day to day meetings, often during their personal conversations. Thus a mosaic of shots portraying the spirit of those times is created.
- DirectorJan NemecStarsGene MoskowitzA unique document of the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968, the movie was begun as a documentary about the liberalization of Czechoslovakia and then became a record of the entry of Russian tanks into Prague. The only filmed footage of the Soviet invasion, it was seen by more than 600 million people when broadcast on television, and it was the first information that the Soviet Army had not been "invited" in. The film also includes never-before-seen scenes from the Prague Spring before the invasion.
- DirectorJaromil JiresStarsJosef SomrJana DítetováLudek MunzarIn the 1950's, Ludvik Jahn was expelled from the Communist Party and the University by his fellow students, because of a politically incorrect note he sent to his girlfriend. Fifteen years later, he tries to get his revenge by seducing Helena, the wife of one of his accusers.
- DirectorCosta-GavrasStarsYves MontandSimone SignoretGabriele FerzettiA high-ranking official is forced to confess to high treason.
- DirectorMiguel LittinStarsSalvador AllendeRégis DebrayOn January 4, 1971, an extensive dialogue takes place between the president of Chile Salvador Allende and the French intellectual Regis Debray discuss the Chilean process towards the installation of a socialist government.
- DirectorÁlvaro J. CovacevichStarsSalvador AllendeFidel CastroIn November 1971, Salvador Allende and Fidel Castro chat to each other about revolution, imperialism, oligarchy, underdevelopment, cultural dependency and economics.
- DirectorMichelangelo AntonioniStarsGiuseppe RinaldiA documentary on China, concentrating mainly on the faces of the people, filmed in the areas they were allowed to visit. The 220-minute version consists of three parts. The first part, taken around Beijing, includes a cotton factory, older sections of the city, and a clinic where a Caesarean operation is performed using acupuncture. The middle part visits the Red Flag canal and a collective farm in Henan, as well as the old city of Suzhou. The final part shows the port and industries of Shanghai and ends with a stage presentation by Chinese acrobats.
- DirectorMiguel LittinStarsSalvador AllendeRégis Debray
- DirectorFrancis DeronJean-Paul TchangRené ViénetA Shakespearian story full of noise and fury, but that means something. In the role of the "Grand Helmsman", Mao ZeDong himself, in the role of Madame Mao, famous actress Lan Ping, aka Jian Qing, as closest comrade in arms, traitor Lin Piao. Co-star-ring the vanished glories of the "Gang of Four". In the role of the proletariat, the Worker XXX. The costumes, the make-up, the gala dinners were kindly provided by the Maoist bureaucracy. Historical tricks: Third International, American imperialism, Jean Chesneaux, the Maoist bureaucracy, etc. The directors thank the People's Liberation Army for its invaluable assistance in eliminating the traitor Lin Piao. As writer Simon Leyes said: "The film gives us back the hysterical liturgies and medieval thaumaturgies of the cult of Mao".
- DirectorChris MarkerStarsSimone SignoretJorge SemprúnDavos HanichFrench essay film focusing on global political turmoil in the 1960s and '70s, particularly the rise of the New Left in France and the development of socialist movements in Latin America.
- DirectorHarun FarockiAndrei UjicaStarsIon CaramitruElena CeausescuNicolae CeausescuThis documentary uses news footage and amateur video to paint a vivid picture of Romania's 1989 revolution and the fall of dictator Nicolae Ceausescu.
- DirectorMichael AptedStarsJinming ZhangYiming HuangYi-fen KanThe film is a documentary about the demonstrations of students in Peking on the 4th of June 1989 for more democracy in the People's Republic which were ended by army forces. The story is told from students point of view.
- DirectorSue WilliamsStarsKai-Shek ChiangZedong MaoDeng XiaopingCHINA: A CENTURY OF REVOLUTION is a six-hour tour de force journey through the country's most tumultuous period. First televised on PBS, this award-winning documentary series presents an astonishingly candid view of a once-secret nation with rare archival footage, insightful historical commentary and stunning eyewitness accounts from citizens who struggled through China's most decisive century. CHINA IN REVOLUTION charts the country's most violent era where decades of civil war and foreign invasions led to the bloody battle for power between Mao Zedong and Chiang Kai-shek. THE MAO YEARS examines the turbulent era of Mao's attempts to forge a "new China" from the war-ravaged and poverty-stricken nation. Mao's death begins BORN UNDER THE RED FLAG, which follows the country's new leadership of Deng Xiaoping and its unlikely transformation into an extraordinary hybrid of communist-centralized politics with an ever-expanding free market economy. Monumental in scope, CHINA: A CENTURY OF REVOLUTION is critical viewing for anyone interested in this increasingly powerful and globally influential country.
- DirectorAleksey GermanStarsYuriy TsuriloNina RuslanovaJüri Järvet Jr.Late winter 1953. The lives of nearly half the planet are in Stalin's hands.
- DirectorGeramie BarméRichard GordonCarma HintonStarsNanyang LiRui LiShao-Chi LiuAbout the shifting, unpredictable currents behind the Chinese Cultural Revolution, this documentary shows the various phases of the 12 years from 1964 through the purging of the Gang of Four at the end of 1976, with some retrospective information about the Long March and the 1958 Great Leap forward. It is built around contemporary interviews with survivors of three families: The most prominent is Liu Shaoqi, the President of China until 1967 & the highest ranking target of the revolution, his wife, Wang Guangmei and his daughter Liu Ting. The most complete coverage was given to a former secretary to Mao, Li Rui, who was banished when he questioned the Great Leap forward. He was rehabilitated in the early 60's, but not brought back into the Party and was banished again when the Cultural revolution started. Li's daughter Li Nanyang who was 11 or 12 when Li Rui was first imprisoned, was a staunch supporter of the Cultural Revolution, but she was never allowed to join the Party because of her father's background. Both daughters' reactions to and discomfort with their fathers was a major thread. This film also highlights the social pressure and Li Nanyang's loss of face among her student peers, which lasted until her father was rehabilitated in 1979. The third family was middle class and capitalist before the 1949 revolution and was therefore suspect. The older brother, Yu Luoke who was refused entry to university, asserted that the revolution was going astray by focusing on the family background of students. His poster asking for equal treatment for everyone, no matter what their family background was celebrated for several months, but then he was arrested and finally executed in 1970. His brother, Yu Luowen now still does not know the whole story, but can tell of how their paper was shut down when the winds changed in 1968. Another thread focused on two teenaged Red Guards, and their disillusionment with the violence that developed after the first few months of the Cultural Revolution.
- DirectorAndrew MoodyJamie PearceStarsEthan GutmannAlbert HoAnnie YangAn expose of Genocide taking place in China against the spiritual movement Falun Gong, which was incorrectly defined by the CCP as an 'evil cult'. Survivors of slave labour, brainwashing, torture and attempted organ harvesting combine with eminent experts, and an investigative journalist, to deliberate on this contentious subject that increasingly involves the West.
- DirectorAndrei UjicaStarsNicolae CeausescuElena CeausescuStefan AndreiThe film explores the image of the Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceausescu using unknown official footage from the Romanian National Television and National Film Archives.
- DirectorRaoul PeckStarsAugust DiehlStefan KonarskeVicky KriepsThe early years of Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels and Jenny Marx, between Paris, Brussels and London.
- DirectorLars KraumeStarsLeonard ScheicherTom GramenzLena KlenkeA group of twelfth-grade pupils in East Germany decide to show their solidarity with the victims of the 1956 Hungarian uprising by staging two minutes of silence during lessons.
- DirectorChris MarkerStarsAleksandr MedvedkinFrançois Périer
- DirectorDziga VertovA series of newsreel films from Dziga Vertov, Elizaveta Svilova, and Mikhail Kaufman which document Russian Life in the early 1920s.
- DirectorDziga VertovA series of newsreel films from Dziga Vertov, Elizaveta Svilova, and Mikhail Kaufman which document Russian Life in the early 1920s.
- DirectorDziga VertovA series of newsreel films from Dziga Vertov, Elizaveta Svilova, and Mikhail Kaufman which document Russian Life in the early 1920s.
- DirectorDziga VertovA series of newsreel films from Dziga Vertov, Elizaveta Svilova, and Mikhail Kaufman which document Russian Life in the early 1920s.
- DirectorDziga VertovA series of newsreel films from Dziga Vertov, Elizaveta Svilova, and Mikhail Kaufman which document Russian Life in the early 1920s.
- DirectorDziga VertovThis documentary promoting the joys of life in a Soviet village centers around the activities of the Young Pioneers. These children are constantly busy, pasting propaganda posters on walls, distributing hand bills, exhorting all to "buy from the cooperative" as opposed to the Private Sector, promoting temperance, and helping poor widows. Experimental portions of the film, projected in reverse, feature the un-slaughtering of a bull and the un-baking of bread.
- DirectorDziga VertovThe first animated movie in the Soviet Union. A bloated caricature of a Capitalist devouring a massive heap of food and drink.
- DirectorDziga VertovA series of newsreel films from Dziga Vertov, Elizaveta Svilova, and Mikhail Kaufman which document Russian Life in the early 1920s.
- DirectorYakov ProtazanovStarsYuliya SolntsevaIgor IlyinskyNikolai TsereteliEngineer Mstislav Sergeyevich Los travels to Mars where he leads a popular uprising against the ruling group of Elders with the support of Queen Aelita who has fallen in love with him after watching him through a telescope.
- DirectorNikolay KhodataevZenon KomissarenkoYoury MerkulovCHINA IN FLAMES rallies popular support for the Soviet Union's alliance with China using an eclectic array of animation techniques and rhetorical strategies. Bold cut-out caricatures of greedy imperialists give way to an allegorical story about rice farmers done in the style of Chinese watercolors. A heroic depiction of a railroad strike follows a crude sketch on the repressive presence of Western missionaries. As with many of the classics of Soviet montage, CHINA IN FLAMES crystallizes abstractions of economics and politics in its rhythmic editing and strikingly graphic approach to composition and written text.
- Silent short cartoon shows the benefits of teamwork and collectivization.
- DirectorLev KuleshovStarsPorfiri PodobedVsevolod PudovkinSergey KomarovIn a capitalist country, workers are heavily repressed but manage to get a "death ray" to fight back. (A part of the movie is lost.)
- DirectorSergei EisensteinStarsGrigoriy AleksandrovMaksim ShtraukhMikhail GomorovA group of oppressed factory workers go on strike in pre-revolutionary Russia.
- DirectorDziga VertovDziga Vertov records the achievements, and some failures, of the Moscow soviet.
- DirectorDziga Vertov"Sixth Part of the World" was the size of Soviet Union of the time. Many peoples of many customs composed it. Ice and desert, forest and ocean. Bread, furs, machines. All and every is a part of great unity.
- DirectorNikolay KhodataevBilled 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.
- DirectorAleksandr DovzhenkoStarsMattea BuyukliA. KlymenkoHeorhii Zelondzhev-ShypovThe true murder of the Soviet diplomat Teodor Nette, which narrates the difficulties in returning the diplomatic bag of the murdered agent to Russia, by sea and before it is found by the British secret police.
- DirectorVsevolod PudovkinMikhail DollerStarsAleksandr ChistyakovVera BaranovskayaIvan ChuvelyovA peasant comes to St. Petersburg to find work. He unwittingly helps in the arrest of an old friend who is now a labor leader. The unemployed man is arrested and sent to fight in World War I. After three years, he returns to rebel.
- DirectorGrigoriy AleksandrovSergei EisensteinStarsBoris LivanovNikolay PopovVasili NikandrovA large-scale view on the events of 1917 in Russia, when the monarchy was overthrown.
- DirectorValentina BrumbergZinaida BrumbergNikolay KhodataevAdventures of a Nenets boy, who returns to his homeland from Moscow an educated young man.
- DirectorVsevolod PudovkinStarsI. InkizhinovI. DedintsevValéry InkijinoffAfter a run-in with the law, a Mongolian man becomes a fugitive and joins the Russian Civil War.
- DirectorAleksandr DovzhenkoStarsNikolai NademskySemyon SvashenkoAleksandr PodorozhnyyAn old Ukrainian man protects and searches for a legendary treasure in the midst of political upheavals.
- DirectorGrigoriy AleksandrovSergei EisensteinStarsMarfa LapkinaM. IvaninKonstantin Vasilyev100.000.000 peasants - illiterate, poor, hungry. There comes a day when one woman decides that she can live old life no longer. Using ways of new Soviet state and industrial progress she changes life and labor of her village.
- DirectorDziga VertovStarsMikhail KaufmanElizaveta SvilovaA man travels around a city with a camera slung over his shoulder, documenting urban life with dazzling invention.
- DirectorMikhail KaufmanIn Spring is a masterpiece of Ukrainian cinema avant-garde, a non-fiction film made by Mikhail Kaufman, Dziga Vertov's brother and co-author, along the lines of the avant-gardist theory of «cine-eye». The film shows Kyiv in 1929, almost unknown today. Pictures of wakening city, its resurging life resonate with lyrical views of reviving nature. Kaufman's attentive camera dwells deliberately on smiling faces of children, lyrically depicting a declaration of love to Kyiv. In In Spring, Kaufman used the method of «hidden camera» for the first time.
- DirectorAleksandr DovzhenkoStarsSemyon SvashenkoGeorgi KhorkovAmvrosi BuchmaA soldier returns to Kyiv after surviving a train crash and encounters clashes between nationalists and collectivists.
- DirectorAleksandr DovzhenkoStarsStepan ShkuratSemyon SvashenkoYuliya SolntsevaIn the peaceful countryside, Vassily opposes the rich kulaks over the coming of collective farming.
- DirectorAleksandr MedvedkinAn basic educational film made for the Red Army soldiers on how to look after their health and hygiene.
- DirectorAleksandr Medvedkin
- DirectorMikhail KalatozovStory of distant mountainous region in Georgia that depicts folklore, lifestyle and daily routines of Svani people, focuses on the scarcity of salt in Svaneti region. Rich with documentary value, the movie also served for Soviet propaganda.
- DirectorDziga VertovHow the miners of the Don coal basin (one of the industrial regions of Ukraine) were striving to fulfill in four years their part of the Five Year Plan.
- DirectorGrigoriy AleksandrovSergei EisensteinStarsFélix BalderasSara GarcíaMartín HernándezHaving revolutionized film editing through such masterworks of montage as Potemkin and Strike, Soviet director Sergei Eisenstein emigrated west in hopes of testing the capabilities of the American film industry.
- DirectorAleksandr DovzhenkoStarsK. BondarevskyDmitri GolubinskyElena GolkiA young farmer and his lazy father try to help with the construction of the Dniprohes, but he learns that strength is not enough for a worker and joins the Communist party.
- DirectorLeonid AmalrikIvan Ivanov-VanoStarsKonstantin EggertThe film addresses issues of racism in the Jim Crow American South. Themes of racial injustice, racial violence, working-class solidarity dominate the film. It depicts black men working in a field, walking in chains, sitting behind bars, and being executed in an electric chair. In most scenes, a white authority figure is seen whipping or guarding the men.
- DirectorNikolay KhodataevOn reasons of works of M.E.Saltykov-Shedrin.
- DirectorAleksandr Medvedkin
- DirectorDziga VertovStarsDolores IbárruriNadezhda KrupskayaVladimir LeninThree anonymous songs about Lenin provide the basis for this documentary that celebrates the achievements of the Soviet Union and Lenin's role in creating them.
- DirectorAleksandr MedvedkinStarsPyotr ZinovyevYelena YegorovaMikhail GipsiA hapless man undergoes misadventures with avaricious clergy, a tired horse, and a walking granary on his road to collectivized happiness.
- DirectorAleksandr DovzhenkoStarsStepan ShagaidaSergey StolyarovStepan ShkuratA Russian outpost in Eastern Siberia comes under threat of attack by the Japanese. Aerograd is a new town with a strategically located airfield of vital interest to the government.
- DirectorAleksandr DovzhenkoYuliya SolntsevaStarsEvgeniy SamoylovIvan SkuratovLuka LyashenkoBiography of Ukrainian revolutionary Nikolai Alexandrovitch Shchors. Shchors leads the peasants and workers to advance on Kyiv.
- DirectorLeonid AmalrikDmitriy BabichenkoVladimir Polkovnikov"Victory Route" is an agitplank from the times of the establishment of Soviet animation and at the same time a report on the holding of the first five-year plans. On the screen the locomotive VKP (b), which rushes to the future. Power plants, factories are being built, aviation and a new army are being created, Alexei Stakhanov is declaring his labor feat. And the unbelievers were initially shocked by all that is happening.
- DirectorDmitriy BabichenkoThe story of the invasion of Russia, during the revolution, by foreign troops from the United States, Canada, the U.K., Japan, Czechoslavakia and Poland. Some sequences are tinted a revolutionary red.
- DirectorIvan Ivanov-VanoAleksandr IvanovAnimation film about the Red Army sweeping the fascist barbarians from the face of the earth.
- DirectorPanteleymon SazonovThe animation film is extremely simple - fascist bomber vultures cross the border of Soviet Union and get what they deserve from the red star hawks. The film ends with the famous slogan - "Our cause is right. The enemy will be defeated. Victory will be ours!". Surprising choice of the sound track - behind the scenes the melody of the "March of the Gunners" sounds. Although no artillery, even anti-aircraft, in the frame there.
- DirectorLeonid AmalrikOlga Khodatayeva
- DirectorGrigori LomidzeStarsAleksey KonsovskiyA film shows the basic historical stages of becoming of Moscow from the origin of city to 1947.
- DirectorIvan Ivanov-VanoStarsGeorgiy MillyarAn obnoxious magpie returns to the forest from abroad and finds a most unenthusiastic audience for her jazz music.
- DirectorViktor GromovFilm pamphlet is staged on a plot of known satirical play of Evgeny Petrov "Island of Peace". Funky by atomic hysteria, American businessman Mr Walk quits his business and with his family leaves on a secluded island - island of the world.
- DirectorJunli ZhengStarsDan ZhaoYinyan WuDaolin SunA story of a corrupt party official who attempts to sell an apartment building he has appropriated from the original owner and the struggles of the tenants to prevent themselves being thrown onto the street.
- DirectorAbram RoomStarsMikhail BoldumanSofiya PilyavskayaValentina UshakovaAn American scientist invents a new weapon of mass destruction - silver dust. Corporate war breaks out between two military industry giants to own the weapon. The scientist dies and his son makes the discovery public with more consequences.
- DirectorJizhou YanStarsZhiyuan LiDeming TangJiao YangNew recruit in the border patrol learns how exciting his assignment can be when he discovers suspicious footprints.
- DirectorMikhail KalatozovStarsTatyana SamoylovaAleksey BatalovVasiliy MerkurevVeronica plans a rendezvous with her lover, Boris, at the bank of river, only for him to be drafted into World War II shortly thereafter.
- DirectorAleksandra Snezhko-BlotskayaStarsValentina SperantovaMikhail NazvanovViktor HohryakovThe story is about a brave boy who never takes off his hat.
- DirectorJunli ZhengStarsDan ZhaoDuo CaoShu ChenBiography of famous Chinese composer Nie Er, who found the meaning of life by composing for national rejuvenation.
- DirectorRoman DavydovStarsMikhail AstangovAleksandr BaranovFedor DimantThe worker believed that by becoming a shareholder, he would acquire rights in the management of the plant, but this did not save him from either losing his job or from poverty.
- DirectorAnatoliy KaranovichWhen a rich racist American family visits the Soviet Union and balks at sharing a hotel with a black man, its concierge decides to teach them a lesson.
- DirectorVitold BordzilovskiyYuriy PrytkovStarsEmmanuil KaminkaYuriy KhrzhanovskiyA dog inherits a fortune and become a influential capitalist snob in the human world.
- DirectorPerch SarkisyanStarsLev SverdlinMariya VinogradovaKlara RumyanovaBased on a story by WWII-slain Soviet popular author Arkady Gaidar, this moral tale drawn in a distinctive, heroic storybook style finds a delinquent young boy trying to redeem his wrongs against a saintly village grandpa. But instead of accepting the supposedly magic, youth-restoring stone Aleksy has found, the old man prefers sharing his backstory of participating in "the most wonderful revolution in the world." - Dennis Harvey
- DirectorPing WangThe evolution of the People's Republic of China is told in this spectacular song and dance production, 'Dongfang hong' or 'The East is Red'. Vast, solemn, and glorifying the progress towards Communist victory, this cornucopia of purposeful entertainment, ostensibly presented in the Great Hall of the People, is pre-Cultural Revolution propaganda at its most lavish.
- DirectorVitold BordzilovskiyStarsNikolay LitvinovAlmost all boys in seaside cities dream of becoming sailors, they are interested in everything related to large ships. The heroes of this history were especially interested in the famous Baltic cruiser "Aurora". Once they made a small accurate model of this ship out of wood and launched it into the water. The small proud ship sailed bravely among the large cruisers, motor ships, boats, sailing ships, rockets, which greeted him in a friendly manner.
- DirectorVyacheslav KotyonochkinWith art direction by noted Soviet political caricaturist Boris Yefimov, PROPHETS AND LESSONS is a stylish variation on the usual Soviet propaganda themes of noble workers standing up to greedy capitalists. The film's song-like structure alternates between Western prophecies of the USSR's ruin and energetic live footage to the contrary. The Russian proletarian is shown to thrive in industry, battle and space exploration.
- DirectorYuri NorsteinArkadiy TyurinA short film made by Yuri Norstein for the 60th anniversary of the October Revolution, The 25th - the First Day recounts that day using art from the revolutionary period.
- DirectorEfim GamburgStarsAleksandr BaranovYakov SmolenskiyThe story of a boy raised by wolves; A call to quell fascism before it can arise again.
- DirectorLev Atamanov
- DirectorVladimir MotylStarsAnatoliy KuznetsovPavel LuspekayevSpartak MishulinAt the end of the Russian Civil War, Red Army soldier Fyodor Sukhov is ordered to guard the harem of a Caspian Sea guerrilla leader.
- DirectorSergiu NicolaescuStarsAmza PelleaIon BesoiuOlga TudoracheAt the end of the 16th century Wallachian ruler Prince Michael the Brave overcame the adversity of the Ottoman and Austrian Empires to unite Wallachia, Moldavia and Transylvania into one country.
- DirectorValentin KaravaevA Nazi officer escapes to Western-occupied Germany at the end of World War II. After his recovery and release from prison, he becomes a popular West German politician, demanding revenge against the U.S.S.R.
- DirectorVladimir PekarVladimir PopovThree young scamps sabotage the Nazi occupiers, thereby setting the stage for a Soviet triumph. Made twenty-five years after World War II ended, this animated pageant still has the pungent tang of propaganda.
- DirectorInessa KovalevskayaAn abstract color celebration of Soviet perseverance under fire (the literal firepower of foreign and capitalist warmongers), this lyrical animated short aims to capture Mother Russia's essence like lightning in a bottle. There's a spaghetti western vibe at times to the striking silhouette imagery here. Florid patriotic folk songs on the soundtrack are often depicted line-for-line in the gorgeous animation. - Dennis Harvey
- DirectorBoris StepantsevSubtle coloring and an impressionistic approach to landscape distinguish this patriotic animated short set to music. After a flourishing Soviet hamlet is destroyed by Nazi planes, the sole survivor is confronted by a hulking Nazi commando in a tank. The military man tries to cajole the young violinist into repeating a jaunty harmonica melody at gunpoint but the boy strikes up a noble song of resistance instead. THE PIONEER'S VIOLIN may romance the idea of martyrdom but it does so with a gravity not often found in similar films.
- DirectorVladimir DanilevichIvan Ivanov-VanoThe horrors of war in Asia by Americans are set to the music of Ave Maria.
- DirectorIvan AksenchukElectrification revives the destroyed country to a new life. Informative cartoon dedicated to the 50th anniversary of the GOELRO plan.