A weekful of Tarkovsky, Eisenstein and two others news

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The Russian Centre for Science and Culture, Cine Darbar, New Delhi, is organizing a film festival from May 15 - 21. The films which will be shown are Piter FM (Dir: O. Bychkova, 2006), Island (Dir: P. Lungin, 2007), Ivan's Childhood (Dir: Tarkovsky, 1962), Stalker (Dir: A. Tarkovsky, 1979), Nostalgia (Dir: A. Tarkovsky, 1983), Solaris (Dir: Tarkovsky, 1972) and Battleship Potemkin (Dir: S. Eisenstein, 1925).

Starring Ekaterina Fedulova, Yevgeny Tsyganov, and Piter FM is the epitome of a modern Russian romance. It really captures the feel of that great city, as well as having a very Russian take on love and friendship. It falls into a category of so-called "films for mood" - the joy of living, the feeling of approaching love... and the beautiful city as one of the main "actors". The plot is simple. Masha is an RJ living in the Russian "northern capital", St-Petersburg. She is going to marry her old school mate. Wedding dresses, cars, flowers - that's her everyday trouble. Running in a hurry to meet her bride who would arrange another very important thing for the marriage, she loses a phone, and a young architect Maksim finds it. Maksim is about to leave for Germany in a few days, but he tries to give the phone back to its owner - several times arranging meetings but with no success...

First of all, the movie is beautifully shot. Piter (St-Petersburg) is a wonderful city with fantastic architecture. In the film, the city is bright, moving, a city with a smile - sometimes kind, sometimes sad or ironical. Don't try to analyze the film; you just have to feel it. It's like music, like an impressionistic picture - the main thing is to capture a short moment, to live for the moment and to enjoy.

Pavel Lungin's film Ostrov (The Island, 2006), winner of 5 Nika Awards (Russian Oscars) including Best Film, is a penetrating drama of sublimation of the soul. Anatoly, a monk who was once a poor-spirited youth whom the fascists made him shoot his fellow to save his own life, acquires a gift to heal people. Two parsons, actually Anatoly's two only friends (brilliantly played by Viktor Sukhorukov and Dmitri Dyuzhev) by the end of the story realize that he had succeeded in healing them, too. Pyotr Mamonov playing the lead seems peerless as usual.

The Battleship Potemkin, is a 1925 silent film directed by Sergei Eisenstein and produced by Mosfilm. It presents a dramatised version of the mutiny that occurred in 1905 when the crew of the Russian battleship Potemkin rebelled against their oppressive officers of the Tsarist regime. The Battleship Potemkin has been called one of the most influential propaganda films of all time, and was named the greatest film of all time at the World's Fair at Brussels, Belgium, in 1958.

In Stalker, we see that near a gray and unnamed city is the Zone, an alien place guarded by barbed wire and soldiers. Over his wife's numerous objections, a man rises in the dead of night: he's a stalker, one of a handful who have the mental gifts (and who risk imprisonment) to lead people into the Zone to the Room, a place where one's secret hopes come true. That night, he takes two people into the Zone: a popular writer who is burned out, cynical and questioning his genius; and a quiet scientist more concerned about his knapsack than the journey. In the deserted Zone, the approach to the Room must be indirect. As they draw near, the rules seem to change and the stalker faces a crisis.

Nostalgia, Tarkovsky's unforgettably haunting film, is his first film to be made outside Russia, where he explored the melancholy of the expatriate through the film's protagonist, Gorchakov, a Russian poet researching in Italy. Arriving at a Tuscan village spa with Eugenia, his beautiful interpreter, Gorchakv is visited by memories of Russia and of his wife and children, and he encounters the local mystic, who sets him a challenging task. The film is filled with a series of mysterious and extraordinary images, all of which coalesce into a miraculous whole in the film's final shot. As in all Tarkovsky's film nature, the elements of fire and water, music, painting and poetry all play a major role.

Solaris is the name of a mission has established a base on a planet that appears to host some kind of intelligence, but the details are hazy and very secret. After the mysterious demise of one of the three scientists on the base, the main character is sent out to replace him. He finds the station run-down and the two remaining scientists cold and secretive. When he also encounters his wife who has been dead for seven years, he begins to appreciate the baffling nature of the alien intelligence

May 15 - Piter FM ( Dir: O. Bychkova, 2006)
May 16 - Island (Dir: P. Lungin, 2007)
May 17 - Ivan's Childhood (Dir: Tarkovsky, 1962)
May 18 - Stalker (Dir: A. Tarkovsky, 1979)
May 19 - Nostalgia (Dir: A. Tarkovsky, 1983)
May 20 - Solaris (Dir: Tarkovsky, 1972)
May 21 - Battleship Potemkin (Dir: S. Eisenstein, 1925)

Venue: The Russian Centre of Science and Culture (Cinema Hall, Second Floor),

24, Ferozeshah Road, New-Delhi.

Time: 5.30 P.M.