Russia

Twelve jurors must decide the fate of a Chechen adolescent charged with murdering his stepfather.Read More »

Quote:
The Communist Revolution Was Caused By The Sun is the second film of Anton Vidokle’s trilogy on Russian cosmism, a metaphysical philosophy and cultural movement that emerged in the late 19th and early 20th centuries among Russian scientists, intellectuals, artists, and revolutionaries, which speculated on the possibilities of space travel; the use of electromagnetic energies to enhance health, healing, and vitality; and prolonged human lifespan, immortality, and even resurrection. This film focuses specifically on the poetic dimension of the theories of Soviet biophysicist, Alexander Chizhevsky (1897-1964), whose lifework involved the study of the effects of aero-ionization and cosmological fluctuations such as sunspots and solar flares on human health and behaviour.Read More »

This is Cosmos is the first film in a trilogy inspired by the ideas of Russian cosmism, which is a unique phenomenon that emerged in the late 19th century, bringing together religious, philosophical, scientific and aesthetic theories united by a common idea of cosmos as a universal order.

Drawing widely on poems, philosophical texts, scientific writings, academic papers, and historical studies from followers of Cosmism, Anton Vidokle has focused on the writings of philosopher Nikolai Fyodorov, the founder of the movement. In creating his theories of the “Common Cause,” Fyodorov advocated for the development of scientific methods for the radical extension of life and the resurrection of the dead, believing that death was a mistake, “because the energy of cosmos is indestructible, because true religion is a cult of ancestors, because true social equality is immortality for all.”Read More »

The rich inner world of the renowned Georgian screenwriter, artist and puppeteer Rezo Gabriadze is as fantastic as the animation into which he has poured this story of his life. Rezo’s director son, Leo Gabriadze, who previously made the hit horror film Unfriended (2014), leaves it to his father to talk about a life suffused with magical thinking.

The movie is an autobiographical animated documentary questioning ideas of deep humanity, kindness and survival during the uneasy times after the 2nd World War.

Winner of Best Animated Feature Film at the Asia Pacific Screen Awards.Read More »

Two burglars enter a summer house.Read More »

Quote:
A richly outfitted journey backwards to daily life in small “family-run” brothel, the film is reminiscent of Federico Fellini’s 1973 Amarcord, set in a small Italian town along the coast in the 1930s.Read More »

Ivan the Terrible (Russian: Ivan Grozniy) is a two-part historical epic film about Ivan IV of Russia commissioned by Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin, who admired and identified himself with Ivan, to be written and directed by the filmmaker Sergei Eisenstein. Part I was released in 1944 but Part II was not released until 1958, as it was banned on the order of Stalin, who became incensed over the depiction of Ivan therein. Eisenstein had developed the scenario to require a third part to finish the story but, with the banning of Part II, filming of Part III was stopped and what had been completed was destroyed. – wikiRead More »

The protagonist finds out that some children were left behind in a sinking school, and is slowly driven mad as he tries to save them. A parable on the theme of the Last Judgment, numerous catastrophic events reveal a certain ambiguity in their origins, accompanied by the terrible suspicion that the things going on are some kind of a performance or theatrical production.Read More »

Synopsis:
A young woman is taken hostage by a police officer and subsequently abused by the lawman gone mad.

Review:
The term Cargo 200 refers to the bodies of USSR soldiers brought home from Afghanistan in the 1980s, but in Aleksei Balabanov’s film of the same name every character seems destined to become Cargo 200, either actually ending up dead or at least ending up in a dead-end quagmire of pointless violence and immoral behaviour. Unflinching would be a gentle word to describe this portrayal of a doomed humanity, but the exact point of the film beyond its doomsday message is never really clear. Unlike other recent excursions into nihilism as expressed through heartless sex and pointless violence (Mortier’s Ex Drummer comes to mind as a recent example), Balabanov’s film never goes beyond stating the obvious.Read More »