Lidiya Shtykan

Naval Battalion

Soviet sailors boldly defend Leningrad from the German fascists.

The Green Carriage

Inspired by the life of Varvara Asenkova, a 19th-century actress who earned great acclaim on St. Petersburg stage before her death at the age of 24.

Konstantin Zaslonov

Young railroad worker, seemingly accommodating to Nazi overlords at a captured rural depot, secretly spearheads acts of sabotage against the evil occupying forces.

While a Person is Alive

Step Forward

Five sad and funny romantic stories about love...

My Dear Fellow

Military doctor Vladimir Ustimenko is a man of duty and honor, committed to the cause he serves, and one single love that he carries through his whole life: Varvara Stepanova is a whimsical girl who dreamed of becoming a great actress but eventually became a geologist. The war will cruelly interfere in the fate of the heroes and confuse their relationship even more.

In the Town of S.

A portrait of a Russian community in the late 19th century based on Chekhov's stories, featuring the author as observer and narrator.

Once There Was a Girl

Woven around the daily lives of two children, nine-year-old Nastenka and five-year-old Katia, this is a story of the 17 months' siege of Leningrad and of the people and families shattered by the war, their homes bombed and destroyed, their lives in a constant anticipation of the advancing German army and air raids.

The Living Corpse

According to Fyodor Protasov, the surrounding life is riddled with dirt and falsehood. He does not want to participate "in all this dirty trick", he does not have the courage to fight it, and he chooses the third way — to stage suicide.

Mama Got Married

A sublime, exceptionally well acted film about a single working class mother and her teenage son. She finds a man and marries him, her son is jealous and full of hot air at first but comes to understand her in the end. That's all. The simplicity of the story notwithstanding, this is one of the most sincere and lyrical films to have been produced in the 1960s-1970s Soviet Union. Very realistic, too, showing the life as it was then. Lyusyena Ovchinnikova is superb, it is this film that makes one realize what a wonderful and under-appreciated actress she was. Nikolay Burlyayev is very good as a lanky teenager, the final scene with him carrying a glass of carbonated water for his mother is stunning. Oleg Efremov is very convincing as a working class man who found his happiness at last.