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The Commissar
The Commissar
8.4
/10
518 Ratings

THE COMMISSAR

Комиссар

Directed by Aleksandr Askoldov
Soviet Union, 1967
Drama, War

Synopsis

1920, Russian Civil War. Klavdia Vavilova, a female commissar from the Red Army, is waylaid by an unexpected pregnancy. While staying with a poor Jewish family to give birth, she is softened somewhat by the experience.

Synopsis

1920, Russian Civil War. Klavdia Vavilova, a female commissar from the Red Army, is waylaid by an unexpected pregnancy. While staying with a poor Jewish family to give birth, she is softened somewhat by the experience.

Our take

Banned for its sympathetic portrayal of a Jewish family, this humane Soviet drama—a chronicle of the lives of women during the war—eventually found none other than Gabriel García Márquez as a champion before resurfacing after two decades. Starring Nonna Mordyukova as the titular Bolshevik soldier.