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| Courtesy of Deaf Crocodile Films |
Between
their releases of Delta Space Mission and The Unknown Man of Shandigor
in both limited deluxe blu-ray disc as well as 4K digital releases, Deaf
Crocodile with its official third release presents distinguished Russian
director Aleksandr Ptushko’s 1956 CinemaScope fantasy epic classic Ilya
Muromets.
The first Russian film shot in the then-revolutionary
widescreen film format yielding breathtaking results, this mammoth visual-effects
heavy costumed period fantasy based on the bylina or Old Russian oral epic poem
about the bogatyr Ilya Muromets of Kievan Rus is at once a sweeping
widescreen phantasmagoria, an answer to western Rodgers and Hammerstein musicals
and at times downright childlike in playfulness.
Starring
Boris Andreyev as Ilya, a man whose wife is kidnapped by Tugars during a brutal
invasion that threatens his homeland and turns his own son against him, the
film is a grandiose fantasy war epic replete with a flying three-headed dragon,
a creature that can blow hurricane winds and a powerful lone heroic figure at
its epicenter.
Predating modern Russia and Ukraine with a majority of the
film’s action taking place in Kyiv, Ptushko’s gargantuan cinematic undertaking
boasts thousands of extras including a striking image of a pile of gold being guarded
by a mountain of bodies piled on top of it and from top to bottom is a dazzling
feast for the senses.
Shifting freely
between adult fantasy epic with touches of the musical to the horror film, the
war movie and heroic journey story, Ilya Muromets is something of an
action adventurous smorgasbord that skirts between Walt Disney, Robert Wise and
Byron Haskin while being through and through a Russian picture. Mostly though it is a big playful dose of escapism that's startling relatable despite some of the dialogue being a little dated.
The ensemble cast is great with Andreyev giving Ilya a
mightiness as well as gentle giant tenderness while invading Asian Tugars led
by the evil Tsar Kalin (Shukur Burkhanov) exudes a reptilian quality,
exacerbated by the film’s wild costume design.
Still, this Mosfilm superproduction’s real star is the film’s director
who lavishes such intense visual command over the imagery you feel as if you’re
being guided by the invisible hand of the realisateur.
Though shot in 35mm, the footage when rescanned
in 4K looks incredible, shot ornately by two cinematographers Yuli Kun and
Fedor Provorov. So beautiful from top to
bottom is this picture it rivals some of the grandest and most expensive
Hollywood fantasy epics of the 1950s. One of those movies where the depths to which the camera can see far armies and mountains off in the distance is staggering to see unfold onscreen.
Sadly for years, American audiences were only familiar with
a heavily truncated and English dubbed version overseen by Roger Corman,
retitled The Sword and the Dragon featuring narration from eventual 60
Minutes reporter Mike Wallace and dubbing from voice actor Paul Frees. At one point the film even appeared on Mystery
Science Theater 3000, further tarnishing the film’s legacy and
overshadowing its virtues.
Thankfully
now, decades later, that has been changed in the best way possible. Officially releasing on blu-ray and 4K
digital tomorrow, Ilya Muromets irrespective of language or country of
origin is a sumptuous widescreen fantasy with dazzling images and arresting
cinematography cementing Aleksandr Ptushko as one of the greatest fantasy
filmmakers who ever lived, period!
--Andrew Kotwicki
