For anyone interested in Russian cinema then you might like to know that Mosfilm (which was the largest film producer in the days of the Soviet Union) has released its back catalogue of films for viewing online:

mosfilm.ru/Films

These include several historical classics such as:

October (1927)
Battleship Potemkin (1925)
Ivan the Terrible, Part 1 (1944)
Ivan the Terrible, Part 2 (1945)
Suvorov (1940)
The Fall of the Romanovs (1927)
We are from Kronstadt (1936)
Alexander Nevsky (1938)
Sveaborg (1972)

and also film adaptations of classics from Russian literature:

Pushkin’s Boris Godunov (1986)
Chekhov’s The Sea Gull (1970)
Gorky’s The Mother (1989)
Dostoevsky’s The Adolescent (1983)
Gogol’s The Dead Souls (1960)
Tolstoy’s Resurrection (1960)
Chekhov’s A Hunting Accident (1978)
Pushkin’s Little Tragedies (1979)
Turgenev’s Nest of Gentlefolk (1969)

The online cinema includes 2 screening rooms which show selected films on a loop for free. The rest of the catalogue is available for rental.
All films can be watched with the option of English-language subtitles.

www.cinema.mosfilm.ru

Thanks for the links, Vizzer.

"Ballad of a Soldier" is on the list, brilliant film.

Have you ever seen Bondarchuck's "War and Peace"? Must have used a couple of Red Army divisions as extras.

Vizzer,

thank you very much for this link. You know that I studied some Russian and as such have some affinity for all things Russian. And yes there are some with English subtitles and even with French ones.

Kind regards and with esteem,

Paul.

With reference to the recent news of the death of Greg Lake whose 1975 hit I Believe In Father Christmas brought the Troika section from Sergei Prokofiev's Lieutenant Kizhe Suite to a wider audience, the original film was released this day 82 years ago. It's a delightful comedy set during the reign of Tsar Paul I:



P.S. For those who are keen to cut to the chase rather than watch the whole film then the relevant musical sequence begins about 41:51 minutes in.

P.P.S. If ever a film were in need of audio restoration and digital remastering then this were it.

Thanks for the link Vizzer. BTW You can still look at films with English subtitles...although they are a bit boring...

Kind regards, Paul.

I remember the Beeb showing Alexander Nevsky back in the '60s (well I think it was the Beeb). Someone had uploaded it to YouTube (it's a while since I looked at it) with French subtitles.  My teen self back in the day hadn't noticed how fake the women's plaits were though!