"Little Vera"

Wed Jun 7 19:58:22 UTC 2006

Benjamin Rifkin <benjamin.rifkin at TEMPLE.EDU> wrote: Actually, "Little Vera" is an important film for understanding the cinematic trend of "chernukha" in late Soviet / early post-Soviet film.

 .................................Yes, I agree, but what culture awareness can students get if films like this one are being screened in foreign language _culture_ classes? 

It is also important for understanding the history of the depiction by Russians of their society in a late Soviet film.  

............................Actually, at that time plenty of films were released, but this one is the only one where the society is depicted so one-sidedly, just because exclusively a political agenda was behind this film. So why show exactly this film? Besides, if the task is to find a film depicting either bad living conditions or alcoholism, sorry, but there are plenty of such films that were released through the whole history of cinema in the USSR. Take "Vliublen po sobstvennomu zhelaniiuâ or "Afonia"... And in the late 80ties and early ninties plenty of good films were released, depicting exactly the time of "perestroika", and they were rather critical, but they were more or less objective which is absolutely not the case with "Little Vera".

Will this film be one that lasts the ages? I can't say.

.........................................Oprah probably canâ¦ Maybe it was she again who is responsible for listing it among the most beloved films in Americaâ¦ I donât know if she has a degree in film studiesâ¦ But if she took a class on European Cinema somewhere, this means she saw "Bronenosez Potiomkin"... When I took this class it was the only Russian film, the students were supposed to see. So sure, after "Bronenosez Potiomkin" anyone, no doubt, can find "Little Vera" a big cinematic achievement...

 I don't want to watch "Moskva slezam ne verit" again, but I won't argue that it wasn't an interesting film for its period.
(NB that film featured a scene of a female character showering, a very
provocative film scene in its context, utterly tame in the American
context.) 

..........................It is a nice movie, simply nice. We still love it. But there are plenty other that are much better. As to the showering sceneâ¦ I donât even remember that scene, but probably because it was not a man who was showering...

Regards,
Maryna Vinarska

P.S. Let's create a list of good films.

 __________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around 
http://mail.yahoo.com 

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Use your web browser to search the archives, control your subscription
  options, and more.  Visit and bookmark the SEELANGS Web Interface at:
                    http://seelangs.home.comcast.net/
-------------------------------------------------------------------------