burnt by the sun

Burnt By The Sun (Mikhalkov, 1994)

Nikita Mikhalkov’s Burnt by the Sun tells the story of Civil War hero, General Kotov, and his impending arrest by the Soviet government which he proudly fought to create. Almost two decades following the Revolution, Kotov is spending a quiet weekend in the country at the dacha of his wife and her family. The tranquility of their family life is soon broken, however, when his wife’s former lover returns somewhat mysteriously following an exile after the Revolution.

It is worth keeping in mind that Mikhalkov, who went on to become head of the filmmaker's union (like Klimov), is a prominent figure both in front of and behind the camera. The role he plays here, the brave and dashing general--which is rendered improperly in the subtitles as "colonel"--works in Russian-speaking audiences' minds in conjunction with the image he created in one of the most popular films of the 1970s A Friend among Strangers, A Strangers among Friends. That film presented audiences with a similarly courageous, noble Civil War soldier, an image itself based on Chapaev and a slew of other Civil War films, and in this film it is as if we see where that trajectory led, as Beumers suggests.

Mitya is played by Oleg Menshikov, one of the most popular actors in Russia today. This is but one of a string of critical and commercial successes Menshikov had during the 1990s, including Prisoners of the Mountain (1996), which garnered an Academy Award Best Foreign Language Film nomination, and East-West (1999), which costared Catherine Deneuve and Menshikov's Prisoners of the Mountain's costar Sergei Bodrov, Jr., who also stars in next week's Brother (1997). Like Mikhalkov's film, East-West tells the tale of an elite family burnt by the sun of the revolution.

This film was made with an international crew and financed by a French studio. It won the top jury prize at Cannes and the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar. When he accepted the Oscar, Mikhalkov charmingly slung his young daughter Anna, who plays Nadia in the film, over his shoulder in the same manner that in did throughout the film, and carried her on stage.

Consider the following questions:

- How does the international composition of the film’s production affect its thematic depictions? How is this important given the socio-political climate in which the film was made.

- Beumer’s article argues that the film is somewhat plagued by historical inaccuracy. Is historical truth an important aspect of this film, or are the differences/similarities between filmic history and actual events more indicative of a more abstract or artistic statement by the filmmakers?

- The titles at the very end of the film dedicate it to all the people “burnt by the sun of the revolution.” How is this idea portrayed in the narrative, thematic, and stylistic composition of the film, and are there other ways in which the film’s title is given added significance outside this explicit reference?

- How does Mitia’s reversal/deception at the end of the film mirror or represent the way in which the Soviet people were treated by the government during Stalin’s reign and the whole of Soviet history?

- How do the repeated references to aviation act in the film to further some of the film’s thematic elements. Are they, as Beumer notes, based on the historical relevance of aviation during the mid-‘30s, or is there more behind these representations?

- How is the role of the family important to this film? How does it compare to familial representations found in films we’ve watched prior to this?

- In what ways does this film differ from those made prior to the collapse of the Soviet Union. In what ways are history and ideology portrayed more openly, and in what ways are they still disguised? How is Bolshevism portrayed, and is there a distinction made between Leninism and Stalinism favoring the former or condemning both?

-How does the film play out the class tensions in Stalinist society, for example, in the scene before and after the family sits down to lunch?

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