Other library resource(s)
Digitalia film library. Russian cinemaCall Number: Streaming videoAt this time, the Russian collection in Digitalia has approximately 30 film titles.
Russian cinema from Oxford Bibliographies Online by Call Number: Electronic resourceISBN: 9780199791286While Soviet and Russian cinema was rather understudied until the collapse of the USSR, since the early 1990s there has been a rise in publications and scholarship on the topic, reflecting an increase in the popularity of film and cultural studies in general.- The Soviet cinema, film, and photography: a selected annotated bibliography byCall Number: Baker-Berry Z 5784 .M9 C64 1976
Keeping up with the journal literature
Want an easy way to keep up with the journal literature for a national or regional cinema? And you use a mobile device? You can install the BrowZine app and create a custom Bookshelf of your favorite journal titles. Then you will get the Table of Contents (ToCs) of your favorite journals automatically delivered to you when they become available. Once you have the ToC's you can download and read the articles you want.
You can get the app from the App Store or Google Play.
Don't own or use a mobile device? You can still use BrowZine! It's now available in a web version. You can get to it here. The web version works the same way as the app version. Find the journals you like, create a custom Bookshelf, get ToCs and read the articles you want.
Introduction to Russian cinema
A Lumière cameraman filmed the coronation of Tsar Nicholas II in 1896; and by 1903 permanent cinemas had opened in Moscow and St Petersburg. The first Russian-made film is generally agreed to be Sten’ka Razin, directed by Vladimir Romashkov in 1908. In this period, cinema was heavily influenced by the European Film d’Art (see france, film in), with Russian film company A. Khanzhonkov & Co producing popular adaptations of Russian literary classics and tableaux of famous Russian paintings. Director Yevgeni Bauer was critically acclaimed for his sophisticated use of literary symbolism and elaborate set design, and Vera Kholodnaya and Ivan Mozzhukhin were successful film stars. The work of animator Wladyslaw Starewicz is considered an important point of origin for a distinctive Eastern European animation tradition. Restrictions on imports during World War I brought about a golden age, with melodrama proving the most popular genre. The films of director Pyotr Chardynin, including Molchi, grust… molchi/Be Silent, Sorrow… Be Silent (1918), were among the star-driven box-office successes of the period. Revolution in 1917 led to the formation of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), constituted from a diverse range of regions, principalities, and individual nation states. Film studios were built in Ukraine, the Baltic States, the Caucasus, and Central Asia (see soviet republics, film in the); but for the next seventy years and more, Russian cinema was officially eclipsed by that of the wider Soviet Union (see socialist realism; soviet avant garde; ussr, film in the). ...
Kuhn, A., & Westwell, G. (2020). Russia, film in. In A Dictionary of Film Studies. Oxford University Press. Retrieved 28 May. 2021
In the Library's Collection
There are several subject headings you can use to find resources in the online catalog. The call number ranges are also included. Please note: there are other sections of materials elsewhere.
- motion pictures russiaThe call number range PN 1993.5 .R9 is located on Baker Stacks 4.
- motion pictures soviet unionThe call number range PN 1993.5 .R9 is located on Baker Stacks 4.
Introductory reading(s)
The BFI companion to Eastern European and Russian cinema by Call Number: Baker-Berry PN 1993.5 .E2 B44 2000ISBN: 9780851707532This work maps the rich, varied cinema of Eastern Europe, Russia and the former USSR. Over 200 entries cover a variety of topics spanning a century of endeavour and turbulent history from Czech animation to Soviet montage. It includes entries on actors and directors and key figures like Eisenstein.
A history of Russian cinema by Call Number: Baker-Berry PN 1993.5 .R9 B48 2009ISBN: 9781845202149Film emerged in pre-Revolutionary Russia to become the "most important of all arts" for the new Bolshevik regime and its propaganda machine. The 1920s saw a flowering of film experimentation, notably with the work of Eisenstein, and a huge growth in the audience for film, which continued into the 1930s with the rise of musicals. The films of the World War II and Cold War periods reflected a return to political concerns in their representation of the "enemy." The 1960s and 1970s saw the rise of art-house films. With glasnost came the collapse of the state-run film industry and an explosion in the cinematic treatment of previously taboo topics. In the new Russia, cinema has become genuinely independent, as a commercial as well as an artistic medium. A History of Russian Cinema is the first complete history from the beginning of film to the present day and presents an engaging narrative of both the industry and its key films in the context of Russia's social and political history.- Letopisʹ rossiĭskogo kino 1863-1929 byCall Number: Baker-Berry PN 1993.5 .R9 L457 2004ISBN: 9785856460864
- Noveĭsha︠i︡a istori︠i︡a otechestvennogo kino, 1986-2000 byCall Number: Baker/-Berry Ref. PN 1993.5 .R9 N68 2001 t. 1 - 7ISBN: 9785901586013
Selected book titles
Charms of the cynical reason: the trickster's transformations in Soviet and post-Soviet culture by Call Number: Baker-Berry PG 3096 .T75 L56 2011ISBN: 9781934843451The impetus for Charms of the Cynical Reason is the phenomenal and little-explored popularity of various tricksters flourishing in official and unofficial Soviet culture, as well as in the post-Soviet era. Mark Lipovetsky interprets this puzzling phenomenon through analysis of the most remarkable and fascinating literary and cinematic images of soviet and post-soviet tricksters, including such "cultural idioms" as Ostap Bender, Buratino, Vasilii Tyorkin, Shtirlitz, and others. ...- Cinema and Soviet society, 1917-1953 byCall Number: Baker-Berry PN 1993.5 .R9 K39 1992ISBN: 9780521428637In this history of Soviet cinema Peter Kenez describes the pre-revolutionary heritage, the changes brought about by the Revolution, the great flourishing of the golden years of the late 1920s, the constraints imposed on artists in the name of Socialist realism, the relative liberalization during the years of the Second World War, and the extraordinary repression during the gloomy last years of Stalin. The author's primary concern is the political uses of film. The Bolsheviks had high expectations: they believed that this medium would be a major vehicle for transmitting their social and political messages, and so experimented with the various ways with which they could bring movies to worker and peasant audiences. ...
Insiders and outsiders in Russian cinema by Call Number: Baker-Berry PN 1993.5 .R9 I59 2008ISBN: 9780253219824Identifying who was "inside" and who was "outside" the Soviet/Russian body politic has been a matter of intense and violent urgency, especially in the high Stalinist and post-Soviet periods. It is a theme encountered prominently in film.
Russian war films: on the cinema front, 1914-2005 by Call Number: Baker-Berry PN 1995.9 .W3 Y68 2007ISBN: 9780700614899War movies have long been the most influential genre in Russian cinema, so much so that in the Soviet Union's militaristic society, "cinema front" was used to describe the film industry itself.
Finding journal articles
Articles and other writings about Soviet or Russian film can be found in many publications. Our collection includes several journals which look exclusively at Russian or Soviet film. You can use Film & Television Literature Index to find articles or use the search box at the top of the page. Below are some of the titles we have in our Library's collection.
Studies in Russian and Soviet cinemaCall Number: Electronic journalStudies in Russian and Soviet Cinema focuses on pre-revolutionary, Soviet and post- Soviet film, its aesthetic development, and its position between ideology and industry.- Kinokultura: new Russian cinemaCall Number: Electronic journalAn open access, online journal for Russian, former Soviet republics and Central Asian cinema.
Iskusstvo kinoCall Number: Electronic journalThis is the leading journal of Russian cinema critics which publishes reviews of contemporary Russian and foreign movies, articles on history and theory of Russian and world cinema as well as general essays on Russian culture and arts.
The current digest of the Russian pressCall Number: Electronic journalEach week the Current Digest presents a selection of Russian-language press materials, carefully translated into English. The translations are intended for use in teaching and research. They are therefore presented as documentary materials without elaboration or comment, and state the opinions and views of the original authors, not of the publisher of the journal.
Film & television literature index by Call Number: Electronic resourceUse this index to find articles about this national cinema.
Screen studies collection by Call Number: Electronic resourceA comprehensive survey of current publications related to film scholarship alongside detailed filmographies. This collection includes the FIAF International Index to Film Periodicals Database and the detailed and complementary filmographies created by the American Film Institute (AFI) and the British Film Institute.
The web of science citation databases by Call Number: Electronic resourceThe online version of 3 separate ISI indexes: Arts & Humanities Citation Index, Science Citation Index and, Social Sciences Citation Index.
Selected movie titles
Find more Russian language films in the library's online catalog.
Kholodnoe leto p︠i︡atdes︠i︡at treʹtego = Cold summer of 1953 by Call Number: Jones Media DVD #1882Among the many criminals freed from the Soviet gulags in 1953 are two political prisoners. While waiting for the arrival of a boat in a small village, they help defend its inhabitants from the marauding criminals.
Krylʹ︠i︡a = Wings by Call Number: Jones Media DVD # 7817ISBN: 9781604650488Suffocated by modern-day living, a buttoned-down headmistress reminisces about her glory days as a World War II pilot.
Moskva slezam ne verit = Moscow does not believe in tears by Call Number: Jones Media DVD # 612A romantic comedy about three young, working-class, country girls who go to Moscow in 1958 to seek work, men, and success. Looks at the results of their expedition in 1978.
Nochnoĭ dozor = Night watch by Call Number: Jones Media DVD # 4313ISBN: 024543237488Living among humans are those who possess various supernatural powers. They are divided into the forces of light and the forces of the dark. Centuries ago both sides signed a treaty to end a war. Now the battle is about to happen again.
Tikhiĭ Don = And quiet flows the Don by Call Number: Jones Media DVD # 6439 discs 1 - 4The film depicts the destinies of the Don Cossacks during the First World War and the Civil War in Russia.
I︡A l︠i︡ubl︠i︡u teb︠i︡a = You I love by Call Number: Jones Media DVD # 2842ISBN: 9781893410770Vera and Tim are successful, young professionals in modern Moscow. Their fast-paced lives crackle with the capitalist energy of excess, consumption and stress - and they are in love. But everything changes one night when Tim's car accidentally hits a cute, young guy named Uloomji.
