Customer Reviews

A Slave of Love

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Nikita Mihkalkov received worldwide attention when his film "Tired by the Sun" got Oscar for best foreign film in the 90s. But Mikhalkov was one of Russia's best-known and most-loved directors since his start in 70s. His brilliant debute was a game in "western" - an "eastern", as they were called in Russia - "At Home With Strangers, A Stranger At Home". "Slave Of LOve" is one of his early films as well, clearly a masterpiece. The story of a filmcrew, shooting on small south town after the Revolution of 1917 incorporates the doomed battle between the Reds and the Whites as well as the doomed relationships between a silent movie star and a cameraman-Bolshevik.
Mikhalkov is playing with the finest nuances of feelings and meanings, creating a trembling, stealing, beatiful and fragile reality.

Modern Russian cinematography has a few intelectual film makers such as mikhalkov and his second movie: a slave of love is full of symbolism. after 25 years i have decided to have this movie in my personal collection becaUSE I NEED TO FIND THE HIDDEN SYMBOLISM of russian culture.

I give this movie five stars even though the ending is contrived Soviet hogwash.
But up until the last few minutes...it's wonderful.
The characters are members of a film crew trying to hide from the Revolution in the resort towns of the Crimea. But of course they can't hide from history, and they know it. So they live through this last summer, already nostalgic for a present that is slipping away. Their love for what they are losing is overwhelming.
THis was the first video I ever bought - I'm glad to see that it is out in DVD. It is beautifully filmed and acted and full of a wonderful bittersweet quality that anyone who has ever lived through a happy day and seen it end can identify with.

Even after twenty years there are scenes from this movie I cannot get out of my head, this was one great film and I would love to see it again if anybody knows how to get a copy. Thanks

Like many Soviet films, the filmmakers have to dance around sensitive issues and toe the party line. The true beauty of this film is not in the script or the story. Much of the script is hackneyed and the characters are broad (and sometimes insulting) parodies (although the cast is first rate), but visually, stunning isn't the word. Not just great natural-light cinematography, but artless. Crimea in spring must be very beautiful, but it is just astounding how perfectly it is captured. And this betrays some simple truths. The censors (and self-censorship) hobbled the filmmakers' art in the USSR, but they could and did cut loose as technical virtuosi. Wow.