The Science Fiction Horror and Fantasy Film Review
Soviet Cinema refers to the films made during the period of the Soviet Union was in existence between 1917 and its dissolution in 1991. Perhaps this topic should more accurately be called Communist or Eastern Bloc Cinema – it principally concerns films of the Soviet Union but we also discuss here works from East Germany, Poland and Czechoslovakia during the time they were under Soviet rule.
The Soviets put out a reasonable number of films that fall into genre material, mostly science-fiction, rarely horror but some that fall into fantasy. Soviet films were backed by state studios that could lavish much on production value and were not concerned, like Western films, with being able to recoup this at the box-office.
Soviet SF of the 1950s and 60s lacks the paranoid fear of imminent alien invasion and atomic monsters unleashed that is present in American SF films of the same era. Mostly it is a series of films about stolid and resolute engineers and scientists travelling to the stars and carrying the Communist ideal with them. Later developments include more sophisticated works like Andrei Tarkovsky’s Solaris (1972) and Stalker (1979) and adaptations of writers like Stanislaw Lem and the Strugatski Brothers.
For Western fears and portrayals of the Soviet regime in genre material see Communism and the Cold War in Fantastic Cinema.
Roger Corman had a good deal of success in the 1960s by buying up footage from Soviet SF films, shooting English language inserts and reissuing them. Bar a handful of scenes with some Hollywood actors, this is almost the whole of the Russian film Storm Planet
Another Roger Corman film made up out of footage recycled from Russian SF films and pseudnonymously directed by a young Peter Bogdanovich in a rather silly plot about astronauts encountering dinosaur-worshipping women on Venus
Czech film from a Stanislaw Lem novel made from the height of the Soviet era depicting day-to-day life about a space mission to explore another planet
The only horror film ever made in Communist Russia. Adaptation of a classic story about a monk sequestered with the body of a woman for three nights, the film creates an undeniable atmosphere and mounts to a wildly fantastical climax where he must face all the minions of Hell
Soviet era science-fiction adapted from a work by Stanislaw Lem, the original author of Solaris. This heads into rather fascinating Philip K. Dick territory, becoming a whodunnit as the title hero tries to work out who aboard a space mission is an android saboteur
Modestly effective Soviet SF film about an expedition to Venus where the cosmonauts encounter a wild and colourful planet of plants and prehistoric wildlife
One of the greatest of all SF films from Andrei Tarkovsky about a mysterious zone filled with enigmatic alien phenomena at the centre of which exists a room that can grant one’s heart’s desire
Called the Russian 2001. Andrei Tarkovsky makes one of the great SF films, a haunting ghost story set on a space station as an alien planet below drives the crew mad with recreated doppelgangers of their loved ones
A popular Polish comedy in its day about two men who awake from cryogenic suspension in a women-ruled future where men are obsolete. Some of the comedy reads as very dated watching the film today
Soviet-made science-fiction film about a mysterious female alien visitor. The set-up intrigues for a time but the directorial delivery is dull and prosaic, while the mystery about who the alien woman is sidetracked by a long-winded interplanetary adventure in the second half
Andrzej Zulawski, known for the demented Possession, makes an SF film about planetary colonisation. The spirit of Andrei Tarkovsky hangs over the film, which is long and philosophically rambling. What you cannot deny is the film’s epic scope and the mad splendour of Zulawski’s visuals
Space exploration films from the Soviet Union about teenagers selected to go on a decades long journey to the stars, this has the same stolid drama of the other Soviet SF films but is better made than most of the others
Obscure work of Soviet era SF. Clearly influenced by Stalker, this concerns an investigation into a mysterious alien zone that has left astronauts with psychic powers. Most of the film drowns in endless discussion and an almost complete lack of drama
Amid, the 1980s body of nuclear war films, all others are English-language made but this is one made by the Russians. The results are incredibly bleak but also have a haunting poetry
A Soviet equivalent of Alice in Wonderland or even more so Alice Through the Looking Glass where a young girl ventures into a fantasy on the other side of the mirror
Soviet film about the invention of a death ray. The first half is a spy thriller, which is fascinating to see from the other side of the fence to James Bond while the second half concerns a great engineering discovery
Adaptation of the Strugatski Brothers’ book about human observers becoming involved in the affairs of a barbarous alien society. Essentially a Star Trek Prime Directive story, the Strugatskis didn’t much like this version
A Soviet space exploration film from East Germany concerning an expedition to Venus. This was the first film to depict an international space mission but proves stolid dramatically
An early Soviet-made film that does an extraordinary job in depicting the launch of a rocket to The Moon. Fascinating to see in terms of its incredible ambition and the things it gets right
A ghastly fairytale adaptation. Classic Hollywood director George Cukor took several stars to shoot in the Soviet Union and the results look like a badly choreographed amateur pantomime, lacking in any essential whimsy
One of Francis Ford Coppola’s earliest films. Roger Corman has obtained rights to a Russian-made space expedition film and handed it over to Coppola who added a few extra scenes to repackage for US audiences
A Soviet SF film about the exploration of an alien planet. Though they tended to the dramatically stolid, these Soviet films had amazing budgets their US counterparts of the era never did
The Russian Aquaman. One of the most popular hits from the Soviet Union, a film about a merman who comes onto land to woo a woman. Said to have influenced Guillermo del Toro with The Shape of Water
Silent film depiction of a journey to Mars from the early days of the Soviet Union that makes for an interesting curiosity piece. The arrival on Mars contains some imaginative sets and costumes