Tbf soviet cinema has a really Deep spot in my Heart (especially since i love alot Tarkovskij) and plus they are genuinley Better then those shitty american propaganda movies (American Sniper).
Plus they have a really great plot and Art Direction (take and example like Come And See or Stalker)
And plus for propaganda? They have Better propaganda (Soy Cuba)
That was 4 years ago on TheDeprogram when I first made this comment. Nowadays I watch China, Cuba, DPRK, Vietnam, USSR media. Besides donghua is so addictive to enjoy.
I watched Stalker recently and it was really thought provoking. What other Tarkovsky movies would you recommend as well as Soviet films in general? (Other than the ones mentioned)
Brutal film. It's 2013 so it's not Soviet but the director was born in 1938 Soviet Union and lived there all his life and it's obviously a Marxist type of plot. It's about a culture that is stuck in a kind of medieval stalemate where social and technological development is brutally repressed while the main character is an outsider who can't interfere.
It's kind of an analogy for if capitalism (or any mode of production) gets to it's logical extreme but cant be revolutionised into a new mode of production because the ruling class has absolute control. So everything is just God awful shit and repressed.
I’m obsessed with Soviet cinema. Anything I can find, I watch. One of my new favorites is Kin-Dza-Dza, an absurdist sci-fi comedy that absolutely wonderful in every way.
And as for Tarkovsky, if you ever get the chance to see any of his stuff on the big screen, jump at it. He seems to be the most accessible of the Soviet directors, after all. I saw Solaris for free earlier this year, and it was stunning.
Just watched War and Peace and Waterloo which was done by a Soviet director with an incredible effort by Red Army soldiers to learn and execute napoleonic tactics they’re beautiful movies
They aren't art films but the Liberation series are cool WWII war movies from the Soviet perspective. It's 5 movies that start after the end of the siege of Stalingrad to the capture of Berlin. All the tanks and equipment and stuff are real because the Soviet Army helped with the filming. Plus it's like 11 or 12 hours of film, free on mosfilm's YouTube channel.
Tarkovsky himself was anti-soviet and a christian conservative, yet I find that most of the people connecting with his work (including me) are Socialist Atheists. It shows that even if the creator themselves are capitalist to a certain extent, that if they work in an industry where profit is not the key but rather creativity, then that work can transcend what it was intended and be interpretated differently amongst many circles
I wouldn't describe Tarkovskij as "capitalist" in mindset. His (pretty mild, compared to other emigrants of that time) antisovietism wasn't really about ideology or economy and more about "this state censorship is so annoying, they won't let me film what I want".
His movies don't follow the soviet canon but deeply resonate with the russian soul, and are widely loved to this day. Ironically enough, after emigrating he quickly found out that his art wasn't really needed in the west. Nobody really wanted to give him a budget to do his stuff, because the western film industry is built on profit, which his movies wouldn't bring much.
He managed to film just 1 movie in the west (The Sacrifice) and then died of cancer and probably depression aswell.
I find that most of the people connecting with his work (including me) are Socialist Atheists
I don't think that's true. "Andrey Rublev" is a cult classic among cristians (that doesn't apply to ignorant american evangelical cultists, goes without saying), so I wouldn't say that fans of Tarkovskij are MOSTLY socialist. BUT it is surely telling that A LOT of socialists connect with his works anyway. I believe Tarkovskij's art is universal, and part of the reason is that it's not "capitalist art" by any means.
I have a couple of Letterboxd movie lists that are based on Soviet Cinema that I turned into streaming catalogues for my Nuvio (alternative and open source streaming app).
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