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Post by hi224 on Sept 1, 2021 22:58:55 GMT
Anyone have any thoughts on that whole filmography.
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Post by manfromplanetx on Sept 1, 2021 23:52:15 GMT
I call it the Barnet touch, his beautiful films from the silent era until his sad untimely death in 1965 are composed from his passionate, humanitarian heart. I deeply love all of his work... Полустанок , Whistle Stop (1963) A lonely aging city engineer and amateur artist Pavel on his doctors orders decides to holiday at a rural coastal farm collective, to paint and for much needed relaxation. Pavel is warmly greeted at the farm, and two charming children befriend him, once everyone finds out he can fix things, Pavel can hardly get a moment to himself. The young girl Nyuska exclaims and constantly reminds him, "landlords must do subsidiary work" after he cleans up and moves into an old shack ... A simple beautifully crafted heart warming film. Two outstanding! child actors are fantastic support for the wonderful lead role from Vasiliy Merkurev (Pavel). A touching and positive final message brings a tear to my eye .. Boris Barnet's final film is one of many treasured gems from the great director. Pure cinematic joy, crafted with original style direct from his humanitarian heart, one of my all time favourite little films....  |
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Post by manfromplanetx on Sept 2, 2021 0:01:09 GMT
Окра́ина , Okraina, Outskirts (1933) is an incredibly innovative film, a cinematic technical marvel, beautifully crafted it is infused with Barnet's dynamic visual style. This early sound feature could almost pass for a silent film. Outskirts tells the tale of peasant workers, the Great War and the 1917 revolution in the context of a provincial community set in a remote village on the outskirts... Lyrical and tragic, war/nationalism tears apart family and friendships. Barnet was an actor's director, he skirted around the stereotypical portraying deeply drawn individual characters while avoiding exaggerated Socialist rhetoric, pathos and idealized heroism. There is no glory from battle here, everyone is tragically affected. Barnet touches on topical issues, focusing on life at the frontlines, the difficulties facing returning soldiers, the workers & the Russian Revolution, romance, capital exploitation, and significantly kinship across the national divide. Boris Barnet set a distinct new tone, he possessed a unique individual voice in Soviet Stalinist cinema with his deeply humanistic worldview it is a trademark signature style, a special quality to his art I call the Barnet Touch. 
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Post by manfromplanetx on Sept 2, 2021 0:04:57 GMT
Щедрое лето , Bountiful Summer (1951) Rural villagers arm in arm are making their way to the station where a local work heroine is returning from Moscow. Having received honorary awards, her homecoming is greeted with much excitement and proud celebration. Arriving also is an old friend, assigned as the collective farm's new accountant, his return will inevitably ignite the film's modest romantic intrigue. A bullock cart rolls along, the backdrop is one of vast productive pastures, perched on top of freshly cut straw a young kolkhoz worker sweetly sings of love. Filmed in a pale pastel "Sovcolor" Barnet's romanticized film overflows with an exuberant crazy charm, the films many musical numbers create a stirring somewhat enchanting air of nostalgic naivety, an atmosphere timeless in appeal... On a homely couch two friends reunite, Piotr and Nazar play an accordion and sing a traditional folk tune under a portrait of Stalin, accompanied with the benevolent gaze of Nazar's elderly mother... Under blue skies everyone is busy, beaming with smiles, filling bags of wheat that will be used to feed the country. As productivity records are being broken in the fields the film story concludes. Optimistic characteristics anticipate a bright and happy future in a land of abundance, where the spirit of mutual aid and humility motivate working selflessly for the common good. Propaganda is a fiction like any other. Undeterred in the restrained late Stalin era, Boris Barnet masterly composed another of his impressive works of cinematic art. "We must remember that a socialist state must give a socialist spirit to movie audiences". A triumph of Soviet "socialist realism", exaltation of the peasant and working-class, the glorification of the collective, inspiring heroic destinies. With an idealized coordinated rhythm, workers, trucks, harvesters and tractors all seem to sing in harmonious unison, an anthem of collective progressive prosperity. One of only seven features from Soviet Union cinema in 1951, it was French, film critic, director Jacques Rivette's first film review for Cahiers du Cinéma. Written in Feb. 1953, he praised Barnet and his film... "Truth is often silenced: with the exception of Eisenstein, Boris Barnet must be considered the best Soviet filmmaker... But who is Boris Barnet? No one will know, he murmured himself; surely a man of spirit, taste and heart; Isn't that enough? .." 
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Post by manfromplanetx on Sept 2, 2021 23:03:59 GMT
Boris Barnet first appeared as an actor in Lev Kuleshov’s satire The Extraordinary Adventures of Mr. West in the Land of the Bolsheviks (1924) Athletic Barnet playing Jeddy the cowboy was forced to crawl across an icy wire suspended between buildings high above a Moscow street. It was from this dangerous stunt that he then decided to be the man in control the man behind the camera…     Мисс Менд , Miss Mend (1926) Barnet co-directed with Fedor Ozep This exciting serial involves a plot by capitalists to poison all of Russia. With sly commentary the entertaining dynamic film is an early Soviet/Barnet embrace of spectacle and melodrama; stunts, tears, romance, and special effects…Boris Barnet plays the heroic romantic lead, the tough action guy. (pic)  Девушка с коробкой , The Girl and the Hatbox (1927) Dir. Boris Barnet Barnet had a great feeling for theatre and theatrical set construction, and equally an artistic eye for realism and location shooting. An enchanting silent film, lyrical, sexy and carefree, in 1927 Soviet Russia ! 
Дом на Трубной , The House on Trubnaya (1928) Dir. Boris Barnet. A daring free work of art not beholden to anything except the pleasure and ingenuity of its makers. A credit to the cinematic art of Barnet who maintained throughout his career his own moral integrity. This was an era when artists in the Soviet Union being asked to subordinate their individuality to the service of the state. The House on Trubnaya Street is an exquisite comedy, portraying the bustle and gossip within a communal house on Trubnaya Street.   У самого синего моря , By the Bluest of Seas (1936) Dir Boris Barnet Barnet’s second sound feature centres on a love triangle between two castaways and a woman from a collective farm on a Soviet Azerbaijani island in the Caspian Sea. Regarded as a little-known classic of Soviet cinema, the film is probably Barnet’s most widely known and discussed film. His direction, the cinematography, his innovative use of sound, and the film's footage of the Caspian Sea culminate in a wonderfully expressive romantic comedy…  
Odnazhdy nochyu , Dark is the Night (1945) Dir. Boris Barnet The war time story takes place in the dilapidated ruins of Stalingrad now occupied by the Germans. Barnet chose to focus not on the war or the Germans, but on his selfless heroine Vari. It is an excellent minimalist film that branches out toward the end with a rousing patriotic finale. 
Подвиг разведчика , Secret Agent (1947) Dir Boris Barnet also played Gen. Kuhn. Based on real events from the biography of Nikolai Khokhlov, Barnet’s espionage thriller was the first film about the actions of Soviet intelligence officers behind enemy lines in World War II. Winning a Stalin prize the exciting spy drama was the leader of Soviet distribution in 1947 with 22.73 million viewers… Pavel Kadochnikov as Fedotov 
Борец и клоун , The Wrestler and the Clown (1957) Dir Boris Barnet and Konstantin Yudin. Based upon two famous Russian artists the excellent film tells of the close friends who take different life paths, their parallel stories interweave throughout, a pensive beautifully filmed work of cinematic art.  
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Post by manfromplanetx on Sept 8, 2021 1:17:27 GMT
Anyone have any thoughts on that whole filmography. Hi , have you got any ?... Inspired, following on from your post I have been re-watching Barnet's films this week, thoroughly enjoyed the excellent Miss Mend, Dark is the Night and Secret Agent... 
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