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| Images courtesy of Mosfilm |
After delivering his
Sovscope 70mm poetic fantasy epic in 1967 with Mosfilm’s The Tale of Tsar
Saltan, a sprawling special effects heavy strikingly colorful widescreen
panorama loosely based on Alexander Pushkin’s epic poem, legendary Russian
fantasy filmmaker Aleksandr Ptushko slowed down for a five year hiatus leading
up to what ultimately became his final film project: an adaptation of Pushkin’s
1820 fairy tale poem Ruslan and Lyudmila.
Recently digitally restored by Mosfilm and making
its United States debut on blu-ray disc through Deaf Crocodile Films hopefully
later this year, like Tsar Saltan before it Ruslan and Lyudmila is
an explosive magical force of fantasy effects laden filmmaking that dazzles the
senses and is a bit like looking at a well furnished dessert display at a
wedding or holiday party. Merely seeing
this stunningly beautiful eye candy unfold in real time is a cinematic feast
from arguably Soviet Russia’s greatest technical magician, an enormous meal
that keeps coming and coming.
Loosely based on
Russian folktales passed on through Pushkin’s youth, Русла́н и Людми́ла tells
the fairy tale of bogatyr Ruslan (Valeri Kozinets) and his bride Lyudmila (Natalya
Petrova) who is kidnapped by evil wizard Chernomor (Vladimir Fyodorov) hoping
to force her to marry him. With the help
of wicked shape-shifting Naina the Witch (Maria Kapnist) who at times changes
from human to animal form, our eponymous hero Ruslan is faced with a series of
increasingly surreal and phantasmagorical obstacles while Lyudmila fends off
the lecherous come-ons of the Napoleonic little Chernomor the Wizard.
Adapted by Ptushko with Samuil Bolotin
transcribing the poetic dialogue and dialects as originally written with
characters exchanging verses in an operatic fashion, the picturesque fantasy
adventure epic then becomes a bit like a carnival ride glittering and kaleidoscopic
with so many stunning visual effects feats on display including but not limited
to upside down water fountains, levitation, flying, a talking mountain and moving
statues thirsty for water.
The final film of
maybe the greatest fantasy filmmaker who ever lived, Ruslan and Lyudmila sees
both director Ptushko and his The Tale of Tsar Saltan cinematographers Igor
Gelein and Valentin Zakharov working to the very edge of their inspirations to
produce something of a sundae of a film.
Delicious, delightful to see and hear with wonderfully inspired
orchestral music by True Friends composer Tikhon Khrennikov, to watch Ruslan
and Lyudmila like many Ptushko films before it is like going on a holiday
ride through a Christmas display while being transported into another dimension
with its own metaphysical fantastical logic to it.
Strictly adhering to the literary text of Pushkin
right down to lines clearly being verses lifted from the original poem, Ptushko’s
adaptation like Tsar Saltan before it is easy to dive head over heels
into without necessarily needing preordained knowledge of the text. Those familiar with the epic poem will get
more out of the experience while newcomers will nevertheless be transfixed by
the wunderkind visuals.
Though moving away
from the 2.35:1 Sovscope 35mm and 2.20:1 70mm ratios respectively, going back
to 1.33:1 Academy Ratio which was the norm for Soviet cinema for many years, Ruslan
and Lyudmila is jam packed with visual information in perhaps the director’s
most technically ambitious undertaking yet.
Watching it play out onscreen I found myself pausing or rewinding bits
of the film to check if my eyes were playing tricks on me. As with Ptushko’s other prior works, the period
costume designs, production design and makeup departments are all working
overtime here delivering impossibly rich vistas. For not being a widescreen film it stands as
one of the most staggeringly epic fantasy films ever attempted.
Co-starring Through
the Thorns to the Stars actor Vladimir Fyodorov who played the villain in
that picture as well, Russian Ark actor Valeri Kozinets as the hero
Ruslan, The Meeting Place Cannot Be Changed actress Natalya Petrova as
Lyudmila and Dark Waters actress Maria Kapnist buried in makeup as the
witch, the ensemble piece features a wild variety of fantastical, deliberately
overplayed performances adhering to a kind of stage theater logic. Of course the film’s biggest star is the one
sitting in the director’s chair Aleksandr Ptushko who covers over the film such
a strong audiovisual command you feel as though you’re in the presence of a
modern movie master.
Though Ptushko
himself would pass on a few years after the inception of Ruslan and Lyudmila,
it remains to this day possibly his most gargantuan exercise of technical ambition
as pure poetic fantasy epic cinema. Few
if any fantasy epics display the kind of proficient pioneering Ptushko’s epics
seemed to do with the slightest of ease time and time again. Recently announced for Deaf Crocodile Films
but currently available on Mosfilm’s channel for the time being, Ruslan and
Lyudmila like Ptushko’s others is quintessential Soviet fantasy
storytelling that will more than reward your eyes and ears with the wonderments
contained therein. Truly wholly utterly
dazzling from top to bottom made by Russia’s very own Mario Bava.
--Andrew Kotwicki
