Soviet Union

Letyat zhuravli [The Cranes Are Flying] (1957; dir. Mikhail Kalatozov) VHS7575

Veronica and Boris are walking in the streets of Moscow and they love each other. Veronica is laughing, cause they are happy together this morning. They see some cranes in the sky. When arriving to Veronica's house they talk about a rendezvous at the bank of the river. And the 2nd World War begins in Moscow. Boris works in a factory and he hasn't got time to speak with Veronica. He has to go to the war ... [Interesting contrast to My Name Is Ivan, its contemporary, b/c it is closer to the Stalinist Socialist Realist model in formal way. In terms of content, it too is a major break with those aesthetic principles. If you are in HIST16E:179 The Soviet Union, 1945-91, please do not choose this film!]

Ballad o soldate [Ballad of a Soldier] (1959, dir. Giorgii Chukhrai) VHS308

During World War II, 19 year old soldier Alyosha gets a medal as a reward for a heroic act at the front. Instead of this medal he asks for a few days leave to visit his mother and repair the roof of their home. On the train eastwards he meets Shura who is on her way to her aunt. In those few days traveling together they fall in love. [this is the film I showed a clip of on 1/24/00]

Krylia [Wings] (1966, dir. Larisa Shepitko) VHS8050

A fascinating and human portrayal of a once-famous fighter pilot and loyal Stalinist named Nadezhda Petrovna. Now a 41-year-old provincial schoolmistress, she has so internalized the military ideas of service and obedience that she cannot adjust to life in peacetime. (though about the postwar period, useful if your interested discussing women and war; dreams as a narrative tool; legacy of the war; representations of dreams/memories).

Voskhozhdenie [The Ascent] (1976; dir. Larisa Shepitko) VHS8251

Two Soviet partisans depart their starving band on a short march to a nearby farm to get supplies. The Germans have reached the farm first, so the pair must go on a journey deep into occupied territory, a voyage that will also take them deep into their souls.

Detskii Sad [Kindergarten] (1983; dir. Yevgenii Yevtushenko) VHS7761

A sprawling, semi-autobiographical film which follows the adventures of a young boy cast adrift in Russia during World War II. Movie chronicles the boy's encounters with people across a USSR disrupted by war. Useful for discussing war and childhood, war and the home front. Film's writer/director the most famous Soviet poet of the postwar era. Cast includes German actor Klaus Maria Brandauer (you'll know him when you see him).

Idi i smotri [Come and See] (1986, dir. Elim Klimov) VHS6318

A boy is unwillingly thrust into the atrocities of war in WWII Byelorussia, fighting for a hopelessly unequipped resistance movement against the ruthless German forces. Witnessing scenes of abject terror and accidentally surviving horrifying situations he loses his innocence and then his mind. (really a product of the glasnost period, which we haven't discussed yet, but if you have some familiarity with this period you could consider this choice [at the very least, discuss it with Prof. Michaels in advance]. An excellent choice if you want to discuss war and childhood]

Eastern Europe

Generation [Pokolenie] (Andrzej Wajda, Poland 1955) VHS 2660

During the Nazi occupation of Poland, a generation of youth comes of age. Stach and his friends start with spontaneous acts of defiance, which can prove deadly, but have no organized purpose. Then, while at work as an apprentice, Stach learns elementary Marxian economics from a shop steward. When he sees the valiant and beautiful Dorota, a leader of the Youth Underground, he volunteers. He recruits his friends, and they become a cell in the resistance, tasting courage, discipline, and tragedy. In the background lies the potential conflict between the Communists and the partisans, both anti-Nazi, both Polish, and on their own collision course. [Both this film and Kana_ would be good choices if you are interested in zeroing in on Wajda's work and seeing how similar themes are treated a bit differently during this initial and remarkable period in his career.]

Kanal (Andrzej Wajda, Poland 1957) VHS 1284

September, 1944. It's the 56th day of Warsaw's uprising against the Nazis. The third Platoon of the Resistance is down to 43 heroic men and women, and they're penned in. After a last day of fighting, and of good-byes to family, to love making, and to music, a handful of doomed survivors wade into the city's underground sewers in hopes of escape. Their valor is tested a final time. [Like Ashes and Diamonds, Kanal is structured as a Greek Tragedy, so what happens to them in the end will not be a surprise, but how they each come to terms with their fate and endure their heroic struggle-in sometimes not-so-heroic ways-forms the basis for Wajda's meditations on heroism, sacrifice, and their place in national identity].

Closely Watched Trains [Ostre sledované vlaky] (Ji_í Menzel, Czechoslovakia 1966) VHS 1253

A young man follows his father's footsteps and joins the railway company, where he learns the job and has his first affair. Set in the country, during the German occupation. [This is the most ironic, cavalier, and ostensibly apolitical of the movies in this selection that are devoted to the war years. It therefore will be somewhat more of a stretch to make direct comparisons between it and the films you watched in class, though there is enough to work with here to use in comparison with either in-class film.]

Cold Days [Hideg Napok] (András, Kovács Hungary 1966) VHS 2436

Four men involved in the massacre of several thousand Jewish and Serbian people in 1942 reflect on their actions as they await trial for their crimes. [This film came out as the post-revolution-1956- repression began to ease up in Hungary during the same year that Shop was made in Czechoslovakia. This will be a slightly harder film to tackle-though not at all for the students with more exposure to East European politics and history-because Hungary is a different cultural context than that to which you have already been exposed. Many of the same themes, moral questions, and ethical dilemmas present in Shop and A & D will be apparent here, however, so you will have ample material for comparison in your paper].