Solyaris is the only one that’s really coming to mind. Not sure I’ve seen too many, but I would definitely be interested in some results as well.
Tarkovsky’s STALKER and SACRIFICE would also count as science fiction. But you’re right, I can’t think of any more just tonight.
The only Russian Sci Fi films I have seen besides those already mentioned are Aelita and Kin-dza-dza!! which are both well worth watching though Kin-dza-dza isn’t a high-tech affair. Aerograd The Amphibian Man and Test pilota Pirxa would be on my want to see list as well. I’m not aware of too many others beyond those though.
However, there are a number of interesting fantasy films from Russia if you have a more open description of Sci-Fi.
Amongst my favorites of that genre are;
The Kingdom of the Crooked Mirrors
VIY
Vassilisa the Beautiful
The Golden Horn
and more recently Night Watch and it’s sequel Day Watch
but they are all very different than Western takes on the subjects so they may not be to everyone’s taste.
Also, there was a good box set released a few years ago on East German Sci-Fi films that were all worth seeing if you are interested in Soviet Era Eastern Bloc type Sci-Fi.
Silent Star
Eolomea
In the Dust of Stars
And I may as well mention an interesting Polish Sci-Fi film from that era while I’m at it;
On the Silver Globe
I don’t know if any of that will be helpful to you or not, or if you’d enjoy them, but I found watching them to be a quite captivating experience since they emphasize quite different concerns than fantasy and science fiction films in the west. If you’re interested in any of them I could tell you more about them, but I won’t waste the time if these aren’t what you’re looking for.
Thanks a lot GREG X !
I’ll look for Kin-dza-dza!, The Kingdom of the Crooked Mirrors, VIY, Night Watch, Day Watch and On the Silver Globe. User comments about these are damn interesting
I’m much more the Solaris type, phylosophical approaches, metaphors, ideas
Thanks again!
On the Silver Globe is possibly the one you’ll be most interested in then. It is the closest to a Solaris type of the films I’ve mentioned. I believe you’ll find that existent copies of the film are missing a few minutes of images due to some censorship issues, but they provide a description of what’s been lost in place of the images, so you don’t completely lose the ideas. It, of course, doesn’t have the same stunning visuals as Tarkovsky, but then again what films do?
Kin-dza-dza seems to have had a low budget, so some of the ships and special effects have a sort of Dr Whoish feel to them, and it is a somewhat comedic take on some Sci-Fi notions, but it still takes it concept more seriously than do most western Sci-Fi films.
The East German films are the same way, in that they are far more serious than almost any Hollywood Science Fiction films are. They really try to make the science fiction aspect more natural and “drier” than would be expected here. Certainly they are also well worth looking at for anyone who wants a less Star Warsian take on science fiction and more of a Silent Running, Colossus: The Forbin Project or Andromeda Strain type of seriousness.
Kingdom of the Crooked Mirrors really interested me in that it is basically The Wizard of Oz meets Karl Marx. It seems to be a Marxist Dialectic primer for children, so if the idea seeing something like that grabs you, definitely look it up. The visuals, particulary in the beginning are quite excellent, and the costumes and characters are fun. I both enjoyed and and was a little flabbergasted by it the first time I saw it. Alexander Rou is quite a talented director when it comes to creating fantastic enviroments on low budgets, and will be worth searching for his other films if you like this one.
VIY is the film on the list that I would first recommend to anyone just looking for a damn fine movie. It could have been an influence for Sam Raimi, if he had ever seen it, since it uses many of the same sorts of techniques Raimi does in order to escape its lack of a special effects budget. It’s extremely clever and fun, but since its based on a Gogol short story, it’s also intelligent too. There is a Russian remake due out soon, or possibly it’s already been released, so that also may be available in the near future.
If you get Night Watch be sure to check for subtitle options since they tried to make the subtitles a part of the film experience in an unusual way. For example, sometimes the words appear to be bleeding or have different colors depending on the mood of the scene. A neat trick even if it doesn’t really enhance the film in any serious way.
I also remembered one other film that might be of interest to you, Ivan Vasilievich: Back to the Future a Soviet time travel movie that is quite amusing, though not very Solarisy so it may not be to your taste since it is Sci-Fi lite. I personally preferred it to the US Back to the Future though.
Test pilota Pirxa
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0080010/
Moon Rainbow
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uBYzfSfuxJM&feature=related
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0089618/
Humanoid Woman
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0126237/
Letters from a Dead Man
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0091759/
Ikarie XB 1
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0122111/
Aquanauts
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c6w0wTKI1Hs
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0197218/
The Sparkling world
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0230046/
Orion’s Loop
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0230634/
Bolshoe kosmicheskoe puteshestvie
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0321492/
Veld
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0201300/
The Sannikov Land
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0136624/
MOSCOW – KASSIOPEIA
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0070413/
Its Hard to be a God
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0097292/
This page of Wikipedia has a list of entries that site has on Soviet sci-fi:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Soviet_science_fiction_films
There was also an ongoing series in the defunct magazine Outre on Rusiian fantasy & sci-fi films. Alas I’m blanking on the titles. Some showed up in the US in dubbed form or were cannibalized of their special effects & had new films built around them by Roger Corman.
‘To the Stars by Hard Ways’ had its moments:
http://www.weirdwildrealm.com/f-stars-hard-ways.html
Test Pilot Pirxa is a lot of (mostly unintentional) fun, but I was under the impression it was polish.
Definitely recommend Kin-Dza-Dza. It’s a strange mix of elements (as mentioned above) but also feels a little like Terry Gilliam’s earlier efforts. And the more I learn about Soviet culture the more the film changes. Of course, Solaris and Stalker are the top of the viewing requirements.
stalker was so bad it made battlefield earth look like star wars, i would definitely stick with the day watch series as thats the only russian film series I have been impressed with.
^ That’s ridiculous. Defend your Stalker opinion.
En garde!
My rapier stands ready.
Give the film another chance. If not you won’t I suggest you come up with better criticism than “nothing happens”.
As Ben. stated in another thread, “Everything happens” in Stalker. If you’re not into contemplative cinema that’s one thing, but claiming it’s bad and that nothing happens in it is ignorant.
Yeah, what’s with the hate for Stalker? That really needs to be explained, or else ignored completely.
And Night Watch was TERRIBLE! Gah, and this line: “stalker was so bad it made battlefield earth look like star wars…” – heh, what does that mean?!?
Deckard Croix, we know exactly what that means, don’t we!
too funny for words really isn’t it.
The first link in this thread is no longer active so I can’t see what films it listed, but I’m also interested in seeing more Soviet films. Without expecting to find another Tarkovsky, there has to be so many films still buried.
Here’s a BFI Sight and Sound article that gives a brief overview.
http://www.bfi.org.uk/sightandsound/feature/49760
It mentions science fiction pioneers like Pavel Klushantsev and the 1957 Road To the Stars space race documentary with groundbreaking special effects and the later efforts snapped up by Corman.
There’s also Konstantin Lopushansky who served as a production assistant for Tarkovsky at an early age and went on to make dystopian films like Letters From A Dead Man, Visitors of a Museum and The Ugly Swans.
I’m interested in Moon Rainbow after seeing The End Of Eternity which was a generic story but stylised enough to remind me that there has to be some heavyweight unseen Soviet action films with this kind of production value. Even using Artemiev as a guide, there’s still way too many blind spots.
javier quintero
I found this:
http://www.sf.perm.ru/eng/solaris/films.html
But I definitly prefer your advice