Plovec/Motsurave
USSR,
1981, 105 min
Shown in 1988
CREDITS
- dir
-
Irakli Quiricadze
- scr
-
Irakli Quiricadze
- cam
-
Guram Tugushi
- cast
-
Gudea Buzduli, Ruslan Mikabezidze
- source
-
Goskino
- premiere
-
U.S. Premiere
-
COMMENTS
Irakli Quiricadze in person.
OTHER
Made in 1981, released in a cut version in 1984, this offbeat comic family chronicle has only now become available in its full version. The censors must certainly have been offended by the film’s staggeringly direct critique of Stalin’s purges—when, for example, some kids innocently drop a porcelain figurine of Uncle Joe into a fish tank, their father disappears the next day and his photo is snipped out of the family album. But its stylization may have been another reason for the film’s problems in being released: Much of the footage is in the sepia-tinted style of silent films and the story is, in Deborah Young’s words, “narrated like a folktale, to the accompaniment of rinky-tink piano music, weird American songs and abstract sounds and noises.” The plot tells of the lives of three generations of swimmers: Just before World War I, Durishhan’s feat of outdistancing a famous English champion earns him only ridicule since, no great genius, he forgets to have it documented. His son, in the glorious ’40s, organizes events like having a formation of swimmers float Stalin’s portrait out to sea on a raft; he is betrayed to the secret police by his rival. Not surprisingly, Anton, the pale, overweight descendant of this line of “heroes” resists taking the plunge as long as he can.
FACTOID #177
In 2000 animator Faith Hubley was the recipient of the Persistence of Vision Award. One year later, her daughter Emily appeared at the Festival with her bandmates, Yo La Tengo, to perform a score accompanying the silent underwater films of Jean Painlevé.
