The 1990s:Reassessing HistoryNikita Mikhalkov’sBurnt by the

Sun

The 1990s

1991 – dissolution of the Soviet Union. Russia becomes an independent country, one of the former Soviet republics.

1992 – financial crisis. Film industry not supported by the state. Unemployment of filmmakers.

1993 – constitutional crisis, siege of the parliament; Russia on the brink of civil war.

1998 – the default (84% inflation).

Free market economy; “shock therapy”; privatization.

Collapse of distribution; the audience chooses video.

Two main trends in film: cheaply made comedies and “auteur films” in collaboration with foreign companies.

Nikita Mikhalkov (b.1945)

Descendant of Russian nobility. Comes from a family of successful writers and artists; son of the “twice-anthem-writer” Sergei Mikhalkov.

Privileged, close to the inner circles of power.

Conservative views.

Leader of the Union of Filmmakers.

Nikita Mikhalkov

Started early as an actor in film I Walk Through Moscow (1963).

Universally talented actor, starred in numerous films of many genres, including comedies.

In the 1990s – 2000s, the dominant figure in Russian filmmaking industry. Organized, in 1984, a film production centre “Three Ts”.

Joint productions with Western companies. Aesthetics “for export” (the opposite of his early films).

Allegedly, was going to run for presidency of the country.

Selected films directed by Nikita Mikhalkov

Sunstroke (2014)

Burnt by the Sun 2: Citadel (2011)

Burnt by the Sun 2: Exodus(2010)

2007 12 (remake of Twelve Angry Men by Sidney Lumet, 1957)

1998 The Barber of Siberia

1994 Burnt by the Sun

1993 Anna: From Six Till Eighteen

1993 Remembering Chekhov

1991 Close to Eden

1987 Dark Eyes (Ociciornie) , starring Marcelo Mastroianni (based on Chekhov’s “Lady with a Lap Dog”)

1979 Five Evenings

1979 Oblomov (after a 19th cent. novel by Ivan Goncharov)

1977 An Unfinished Piece for a Player Piano (based on Chekhov)

1976 Slave of Love

1974 At Home Among Strangers

The Barber of Siberia:the most expensive film project ever in

Russia (40 million dollars) makes audience return to movie theatres

Burnt by the Sun (1994)

Reassessment of history: action takes place in 1936.

The film is “dedicated to everyone who was burnt by the sun of the revolution.”

Anti-communist sentiment; the theme of “paradise lost.”

Influenced the outcome of the 1996 presidential election when a communist candidate was close to winning (instead, Boris Yeltsin was re-elected).

Mikhalkov and his daughter Nadya receiving an Oscar for Burnt by the

Sun in 1994

Burnt by the Sun, 1994

Main characters:

Kotov (Nikita Mikhalkov), a Red Army general, highly revered hero of the Civil War, Stalin’s friend

Maroussia (IngeborgaDapkunaite), his wife; Nadya, their daughter

Mitya (Oleg Menschikov), Maroussia’schildhood friend she was in love with, absent for 10 years; a former White army officer, now an agent of Stalin’s secret police.

No conclusive judgement passed: Kotovand Mitya are both victims and villains.

Burnt by the Sun

Burnt by the Sun

The problem of alienation (“at home among strangers, stranger among friends”)

Literature is an important influence and source of the film’s aesthetics (Chekhov’s plays; Russian novels).

Cinematic effects: space as means of characterization; lighting.