Light and Dark: Stagnation Period Comedies (approx. 1964-85)

1. Light and Dark: Stagnation Period Comedies (approx. 1964-85)

2. Comedies as a response to life’s dullness • Life under Brezhnev: no economic growth, no positive social changes, especially after 1968 • free thinking (the dissidents) suppressed • Many cultural figures driven abroad: Solzhenitsyn, Brodsky, Rostropovich, Baryshnikov • The reign of bureaucracy • Bleak life: Lining up for food; “getting” clothes and other stuff • Jokes and comedies as antidotes to the monotony and hopelessness

3. The differences of the Soviet cultural system from the West • Detached from the market place: money provided by the state • No reason to work efficiently • Interaction between the needs of the party and the creative freedom of the individual - testing the limits of the permitted. • “Familial" relations between the different camps (Dom Kino). • Inefficiencies in the system of control (e.g., approval of script, but no control over the production) • Control over distribution. Filmmakers didn’t get royalties.

4. The separate strands of film production • “Opportunists” (commercial and political) who worked for the system (Bondarchuk – War and Peace (1968); Menshov - Moscow Does Not Believe in Tears, (1979, Best foreign film, 1980) • “Messianic elitism”- Andrei Tarkovsky, Paradzhanov • “Populists” who steered a middle course (Eldar Ryazanov, Nikita Mikhalkov, Larisa Shepitko), giving good middle-brow films • “Entertainment” classics (Leonid Gaidai’s comedies), The White Sun of the Desert (Vladimir Motyl, 1970) • Cartoons (the multfilms, мультфильмы) for children (Cheburashka)

5. The White Sun of the Desert(1970), by Vladimir Motyl

6. The White Sun of the Desert • Ironic comedy become a cult movie: quoted in everyday conversation • Takes place in the desert on coast of the Caspian sea at the end of the Civil War (1920) • Framing in letters to hero Sukhov’s fiancée in Russia • Cultural differences between Russians and Muslims: girls in Abdullah the bandit’s harem

7. The White Sun of the Desert • Celebrates myth of Russian “values” in hero Sukhov: carefree attitude to life, vodka, gallantry to women, trust betrayed, winning in the end • Shades of Chapaev: Sukhov with the machine-gun • Western-style drama: shoot-out on boat • Comedy of characters • Pathos: young innocent soldier, Pasha the honest customs officer killed • Music: popular song “Your Excellency”

8. Leonid Gaidai (1923-93) • Scriptwriter and director • Slapstick comedies with elements of music comedy • Best comic actors • Popular punch lines • Smuggled irony and social criticism • Success (up to 76 million tickets sold per film)

9. The great comic trio (Vitsin, Nikulin, and Morgunov)

10. Kidnapping, Caucasian Style (1967) • Patriarchal values, money and power vs youth, love, liberated woman • Protagonists: young students • Villain: a party member who hires petty criminals • Song about polar bears • Features twist - a “bourgeois” dance in positive light

11. Kidnapping, Caucasian Style (1967)

12. Kidnapping, Caucasian Style (1967)

13. Ivan Vasilievich Switches Profession (1973) • Time machine, Ivan the Terrible, “back to the future” theme • Colour vs black and white = dream vs reality (ironic comment on the epoch?)

14. The Diamond Arm (1968) • Semion, a good family man, gets a chance to go on a cruise and travel abroad • Meets a “nice guy” who is a gang member • Smugglers take Semion for that guy and put diamonds in the cast on his “broken” arm • Back at home, Semion collaborates with the police as a sitting duck while the gangsters try to get the diamonds at all cost • Misunderstandings and confusion; happy ending

15. The Diamond Arm (1968)

16. More comediesand cartoons of the Stagnation era Everyday life and philosophical exploration of being

17. Eldar Ryazanov (b.1927) • Numerous hit comedies, including Irony of Fate, shown every New Year’s Eve since 1975 • Comedy of characters • Irony • Poetry and songs in films • Social criticism • Humanistic values

18. Office Romance (1977)by E. Ryazanov A sad (despite the happy ending) and detailed comment on many aspects of life during the Stagnation (dull senseless work, hypocrisy, lies, overloaded women, ugly daily life, line-ups, monotony, hopelessness).

19. Georgy Danelia (b.1930) Among his most popular films: • I Walk Through Moscow (1963) • Afonia (1975) • Mimino (1977) • Autumn Marathon (1979) • Kin-dza-dza (1986)

20. Mimino (1977) • Georgian, Armenian and Russian characters: Soviet Union at its best • A man in search for himself • Mild irony, comedy of characters and situation; verbal comedy • Human values tested and asserted (friendship, love for one’s birthplace and family, one’s vocation, etc.)

21. Autumn Marathon (1979) • Sad comedy, tragicomedy • Pathetic, indecisive (though endearing) character caught between two women • Complex irony • Subtle social criticism: day by day, nothing changes • The central problem unresolved – a metaphor for the Stagnation • Vodka as the only solution

22. Questions • What type of comedy is this? (slapstick/verbal; absurd; dark; farcical; situational/character; screwball; romantic) • How would you characterize this comedy? • What is Russian about it? Is it different from the comedies you know? • Do you sense any irony? • What is comic about it, where is the humour? • What comic devices are used? (hyperbole; misunderstanding; qui pro quo; culture clash; etc.)