Nikolai Khodataev: Interplanetary Revolution

Nikolai Khodataev (born 120 years ago on May 9, 1892) presumably started shooting this avant-garde piece to be included in Aelita, another innovative film by Yakov Protazanov (1924) based on Alexei Tolstoy’s novel.

However, later it was completed as an but relevant independent piece. The early 1920s was the time of booming avant-garde art in the Soviet Union, not only in film (Eisenstein’s The Strike an Battleship Potemkin, Dziga Vertov’s Kinoeye), but also visual art (Vladimir Tatlin, Lazar (El) Lissitzky), photography and design (Alexander Rodchenko). Many constructivist and futurist artists strongly supported the Bolsheviks considering themselves artistic revolutionaries. The plot reflects expectations of the unavoidable revolutions around the world. Having overcome class enemies on Earth, the Soviet champion flies to Mars to spark interplanetary revolution.

No capitalist could survive the Bolshevik warrior springing out of his mirror.

Khodataev employed cutout stop motion technique combing photographic and hand drawn backgrounds. He was one of the first Soviet animation directors who helped to establish this industry and produced over a dozen animated propaganda films until the mid 1930s when he switched to painting and sculpting.

Interplanetary Revolution (Межпланетная революция, 1924)

Silent, with English subtitles

100 years of Russian Animation: Once There Was a Dog

This April marks centennial anniversary of Russian animation.  While recently rediscovered works of Alexander Shiryaev are dated between 1906 and 1909, it was Vladislav (Ladislav) Starevich who presented his first cartoon The Beautiful Leukanida (stop-motion cartoon with animated bugs as “actors”) a century ago, in spring (presumably in April) of 1912. To celebrate this occasion during the recent Open Festival in Suzdal a list of a hundred most acclaimed Russian/Soviet cartoons was created. Once There Was a Dog by prominent animator and educator Eduard Nazarov became the most popular film, followed by equally famous Hedgehod in the Fog by Yuri Norshtein and Winnie the Pooh by Fyodor Khitruk.

Once There Was a Dog (Жил-был пёс, 1982) is a beloved animation story based on Ukrainian folklore about misfortunes of an old dog. If features right combination of humor, ethnic/rural flavor, and themes of loneliness, friendship, and empathy.

Russian, with English subtitles

Contemporary Russian Animation – Suzdal 2012

12th Open Russian Festival of Animated Film took place in Suzdal this March. Here are some of the festival featured animation shorts

Goo Goo Babies by Alexei Alexeev (known for his “Log Jam” shorts)

wordless

 

Tough Joe by Anton Koroliuk

wordless

 

Green Teeth by Svetlana Adrianova

story about a lazy boy and scary school principal

Animated Gogol: Alexandre Alexeieff’s The Nose, 1963

Nikolai Gogol (1809-1852) is one of the most influential Russian writers. Several of his short stories were adopted for animation. Particularly appealing for the Soviet animators were Gogol’s early stories influenced by Romantic-era interest in nationhood and folklore and inspired by the Ukrainian legends and customs (Gogol was born in Poltava province, in what now is Ukraine). There are about 10 Soviet/Russian animated shorts based on Gogol. The Nose is a one of the Petersburg stories (that include famous The Overcoat). The story consists of three parts; in first a barber finds a nose in his bread and tries to get rid of it. Second part is about the Major Kovalev who finds “only a flat patch on his face where the nose should have been”. Kovalev goes to a newspaper office and police trying to locate his nose. He meets the Nose, who is now a high-rank official in the Kazan cathedral. At the end a policeman returns Kovalev his nose, but if fails to stick back. In the third part, Kovalev wakes up and excitedly finds his nose in its proper place. The Nose is one of most grotesque and unique masterpieces of the Russian literature.

This version of Gogol’s The Nose was filmed in France by Alexandre Alexeieff who was born in Russia, but spent most of his life in France. Alexeieff invented pinscreen technique and pioneered in using for animation. In Le Nez he managed to create rich grayscale palette with deep shadows reminding engravings. Smooth wordless animation shows a dream-like story.

World of police and civil service play prominent role in many Gogol’s works, including The Overcoat, Dead Souls, and The Government Inspector.  To underline the Kafkaesque world of imperial bureaucracy, Alexeieff emphasized disturbing presence of ever-seeing figure of an official in a bicorne hat.

Authoritarian Nicholas I, the adept of a rigid centralized bureaucracy.

Le Nez, 1963

Wordless

Part 1

Part 2

There are at least two other animated versions of The Nose.

A Nose, 1966 by Mordi Gerstein

English adaptation

Adapting Gogol to the visual media is extremely challenging due to the role of language in his works. Beautiful mixed technique animation short by Mikhail Lisovoi preserved narration in film.

The Major’s Nose (Нос майора), 1997 by Mikhail Lisovoi

Russian, no subtitles available

Wingless Gosling

Beautifully executed cartoon by Olga Cherkasova based on the Chukchi legend about a journey of a gosling between the worlds and his meeting with Kutkh, a spirit of Raven.

Бескрылый гусенок (Wingless Gosling), Sverdlovsk studio, 1988.

Russian, with English subtitles

Animated lubok: Cat and Company

Lubok (Лубок, from луб, bark of linden) is a traditional Russian woodcut print. Originated in Europe, lubok became a popular media in the 17-18th century and could be described as an early comics. Usually, lubok prints depicted historical, religious, comical, or fairy tale scenes with minimal text. Often lubok prints were hand painted. Just like on the Web, one of the most popular characters of lubok was the Cat, usually described as “The Cat of Kazan, the Mind of Astrakhan, the Wisdom of Siberia” that sounded somewhat like title of the Russians tsars (We, by the grace of God, Emperor and Autocrat of all the Russians, of Moscow, Kiev, Vladimir, Novgorod, Tsar of Kazan, Tsar of Astrakhan, Tsar of Poland, Tsar of Siberia, etc; The Cat is sometimes considered to be a satire on the Russian tsars and particularly on Peter the Great).

Another popular “comics” is a carnival scene of the mice burying the Cat (mentioned in some Russian classic literature including Alexander Pushkin’s The Captain’s Daughter). Some of the mice have  rhymed absurd inscriptions mentioning their names and occupations. Fantastic inverted world where weak creatures bury the strong enemy was a common for European folk culture, but lubok artists add unique Russian environment. There are various interpretations of such lubok scenes usually mentioning social satire and the skomorokh tradition of wandering actors (Russian version of mummers).

18th century lubok “The Mice are burying the Cat”

and its implementation in the cartoon

Brightly, roughly colored grotesque pictures are being rediscovered during the recent decades and inspired several animation shorts. One of the best known is Alexander Guriev’s Cat and Company  (Soyuzmultfilm). Shot during the late perestroyka, this witty cartoon skillfully incorporates bold colors and minimalist style of lubok. The kind-hearted cat does not want to catch mice and dreams about learning to fly (thus becoming free). When he is locked by his mistress, all mice gather to help him by arranging a funeral procession that mimics bombastic funerals of the Soviet leaders during the early 1980s (Brezhnev died in 1982, Andropov in 1984, Chernenko in 1985).

Note one of the mice holding a poster depicting the Cat in a suit with numerous medals, satire on Brezhnev and his passion to decorate himself.

Alexander Guriev, Кот и компания (Cat and Company), 1990

No knowledge of Russian is required

N.B. Modern animation artist Andrey Kuznetsov created a gallery of modern lubok interpreting popular movies and cartoons, including Cheburashka (in Russian). Some of them are translated here.

Soviet cartoons of the Second World War, part 3: Kino-Circus and Newsreel of Politsatire

Cinema and animation were important propaganda tools of the war. The patriotic, Russophilic theme dominated the Soviet cinema of decade. The films about the Russian military leaders shot during the 1940s include Vsevolod Pudovkin’s Suvorov (1940), Igor Savchenko’s Bogdan Khmel’nitsky (1941),  Vladimir Petrov’s Kutuzov (1943), Vsevolod Pudovkin’s Admiral Nakhimov (1946), and of course Sergei Eisenstein’s chef d’oeuvre Ivan the Terrible (1943-1946).

During four years of the Second World War Soyuzmultfilm produced about 20 cartoons. Most of them are short political satire aimed at the Nazis. While this number appears to be low when compared with the US film industries, however, one should remember about the extreme hardships the Soviet Russia faced during the war. In 1941-1943 Soyuzmultfilm was evacuated to Samarkand (Uzbekistan).

Кино-цирк (Kino-Circus), 1942 is one of the few cartoons made in the darkest time of the war by Leonid Amalrik, Olga Khodatayeva, and her brother Nikolai Khodatayev – a short piece with three “attractions” aimed at Hitler. The first episode is about dogs representing the German allies (Italy, Hungary, and Romania), second compares Hitler with Napoleon and recalls his unsuccessful war with Russia in 1812, and third depicts Hitler as a clumsy juggler playing with fire.

Parallel with Napoleon was often used to remind about the defeat of Napoleon’s armies in Russia. World War II is often referred as the Great Patriotic War (Великая Отечественная война), just like the war of 1812  was called the Patriotic War (Отечественная война). The motif of the powerful, but unsuccessful invasion is reflected not only in cinema (Kutuzov, 1943) and animation, but also in books, and even propaganda leaflets

Soviet poster (in German), 1942 “Napoleon: This dwarf would be a great commander”

Кино-цирк (Kino-Circus), 1942  Russian, with English subtitles

One of the US cartoons of the wartime somewhat dedicated to the Soviet allies was Russian Rhapsody where Hitler meets his archenemy, mustachy Gremlin from the Kremlin.

Russian Rhapsody, 1944

Friendly handshake of the Soviet and British soldiers that crushes the Nazi dwarf is shown in another Olga Khodatayeva’s short, Newsreel of Politsatire №2 (Журнал политсатиры №2), 1941

Russian, with English subtitles

This attitude did not last for long after the end of the war. Soon, as a part of the propaganda machine, Soviet cartoons would depict ex-allies in a completely different, negative way.

Dziga Vertov’s Soviet Toys

Dziga Vertov (David Kaufman, 1896 – 1954) is  famous for his radical fresh approach to the documentary cinema.  His Man with a Movie Camera and Kino Eye became true classic of the Soviet silence avant-garde of 1920s. However, he managed to try himself as an animator, too.

Soviet Toys (Советские игрушки), 1924

silent, with English subtitles

In 1924 he directed one of the earliest Soviet animation Soviet Toys.  Like many works of Vertov, this animation short is a heavily propagandistic piece of art aimed at NEPman, a member of a new wealthy social class of the 1920s. NEP (New Economic Policy) was born in the result of the temporary liberalization of the Soviet economy in the 1920s. This cartoon also aims at the Russian Orthodox Church that was suppressed during the 1920s-1930s particularly harshly although a caricature depiction of the fat corrupt priest was not atypical even for the pre-revolutionary Russia. The other priest is a satirical representation of the so-called Living Church (обновленцы) that was established in 1922 during the schism within the Orthodox church.

NEP helped to recover post-Civil War Russia, but was often criticized as a return of the capitalist past particularly by the left-wing activists and avant-garde artists like Vertov who promoted building of the new Communist society. NEP lasted for less than a decade, until Stalin became an ultimate Soviet leader in 1928. Vertov rather accurately predicted the decline of NEP: after the worker and peasant (literally) unite they manage to crush NEPman and take all his money.

Soviet toys ends with the scene of the Christmas tree composed of the Red Army soldiers who literally hang fat NEPman, his girlfriend, both priest, and the worker and peasant climb to the top of the new social order.

As Lenin stated, the capitalist will sell us rope with which we will hang them.  After NEP helped to recover the state of economy, it was prohibited and private entrepreneurs were forced to close their businesses.

Vertov was interested in exploring various media and employed animation technique in some of his documentaries, including stop motion sequence in his famous Man with a Movie Camera (Человек с киноаппаратом), 1929. Though roughly made, Soviet Toys is one of the important artifacts of the dawn of the Soviet animation.

Soviet cartoons of the Second World War, part 2

Soviet propaganda of the 1930s was depicting the mighty Red Army that would win any war “with little blood and on the enemy’s territory”. March of the Soviet Tankmen, a popular song composed in 1939 proclaimed:

The armor is hard and our tanks are fast

And our men are full of courage

The Soviet tankmen are ready for action—

Sons of their Great Motherland.

 

Refrain:

Thundering with fire, glinting with steel,

The tanks will begin a harsh campaign

When we’re called to battle by Comrade Stalin

And the First Marshal [K. Voroshilov] will lead us in this battle!

                     Stalin and Voroshilov on the 1935 poster by Gustav Klutsis.

This song was also used in the Ivanov-Vano’s Не топтать фашисткому сапогу нашей Родины (Fascist Boots Shall Not Trample Our Motherland), 1941. Like some other propaganda cartoons, it emphasizes the beastly nature of the German invaders and portrays an overwhelming military response by the Red Army forces, including both brave cavalry, iconography of the Russian Civil War, and modern tanks and aircrafts. It also features notion of the unexpected nature German invasion that would be later extensively used to explain heavy losses during the early stages of the Great Patriotic War.

Russian, with English subtitles

Soviet cartoons of the Second World War, part 1

Хищники (Vultures), 1941 by Panteleimon Sazonov is a short propaganda cartoon about “Stalin’s falcons” – inculcated term for the Soviet aviation. Propaganda of aviation as the most modern and advanced mean of warfare was extremely popular during the 1930-1940s.

Hail to Stalin’s Falcons, 1941 – one of many aviation-themed Soviet posters

The Nazi vulture-looking bombers are being destroyed by the Soviet planes (inspired by famous I-16). In reality, during the early stages of the war the losses of the Red Army and Soviet Air Force  were extremely heavy.

Russian, with English subtitles