Chekhov's Gun

As the story goes, a fortune teller told young Andrei that he would only make seven good films.  This collection puts together the seven feature films of Tarkovsky in a handsome box set for the first time.  But, alas, Tarkovsky had one film up his sleeve, a student film he made while at the State Institute of Cinematography (VGIK), which was an adaptation of Ernest Hemingway's The Killers . Volkov notes in his book, The Magical Chorus, that Tarkovsky along with Brodsky were part of the "stilyagi" in the mid 50s and Tarkovsky was a big fan of Hemingway, who was being printed for the first time in the Soviet Union.  The film is included in the Criterion collection of The Killers , which features Robert Siodmak's 1946 classic, as well as the later 1964 remake by Don Siegel. It is best to start at the beginning with Tarkovsky.   Ivan's Childhood is his most accessible film and was very popular in the Soviet Union when released in 1962.  War movies were the st...

Oleg Yankovsky passed away in 2009, but his legacy lives on in film.  We were watching Khrani menya, moy talisman (Keep me, my talisman) the other night, in which a young Yankovsky is part of a love triangle with Tatyana Dubrich and Alexandr Abdulov, as they document the Pushkin Poetry Festival in Boldino, Some marvelous cameos by Bulat Okudzhava and others in the film, which dates from 1986  Yankovsky was one of Russia's favorite actors.  His filmography is mostly known within the country, but he also played in Tarkovsky's Mirror (1974) and Nostalghia (1983).