A Comissaria

A film on the same echelon as Kilmov's Come And See, Jancsó's The Red and The White, Shepitko's Ascent and the great Russian silents as well as the vanguard 60s cinema. This is one of those films where image and sound form a perfect marriage committing to screen an onslaught of ingenious, uproarious and emotional imagery marred with wonderful sound design and score, all strung together by ingenious editing. This is cinema.

The story is one of a Red Army woman officer during the Russian civil war, who ends up pregnant and is forced to live with a Ukrainian Jewish family, who has been used and abused countless times by the red and the whites. This is a story of humans coming together and setting aside their differences and understanding each other amongst suffering and strife. It is a test of loyalty to one's self, one's family, one's country.

Commissar was banned on its initial completion and writer/director Aleksandr Askoldov was kicked out of the Communist party and not allowed to work in the film business in any form again. It wasn't until 1988 that the ban was lifted and the soundtrack remastered/re-done along with a reconstruction of the picture, which was fairly intact. But not until now has it been wildly available so I really would urge anyone who enjoys Kurosawa, Tarkovsky, Tarr or any of the before mentioned films to seek this one out. The US DVD from Kino is probably their best transfer yet; very pristine and sharp with no a lot of dirt or scratches, although it is from a PAL source so there are some ghosting effects on large movements, making the picture look simultaneously in slow mo and normal frame rate

Don't be tricked by the rating. This movie is wildly, unforgivably underrated on IMDb. To speak of its beauties would take me volumes. Suffice it to say: find it, if you can (it may be still available in good video stores, on VHS) and be enthralled by one-of-a-kind movie. As opposed to overrated 8+ 9+ c... like American Beauty or the Korean Oldboy and other movies full of either vapid pomposity or of guts and gore and blood and nonsense, Komissar is an extraordinarily beautiful and fluent meditation on human nature, war, religion, childhood, good and evil. Miss it at your own peril.

10 out of 10

One of the reasons that Commissar was initially banned in the Soviet Union was the use of religious imagery in the film. One example of this is shortly after Vavilova, the Commissar, has her baby. She walks by a graveyard, and the Russian Orthodox crosses are prominently featured in the shot. This can be interpreted to mean that Vavilova was forced to carry the baby, which she initially considers a burden, in the same manner that Christ had to carry His cross. It could also symbolize the idea of a life cycle, where Vavilova just had a child and is then seen at the cemetery, where she is surrounded by death. Another instance where crosses appear in the film was when Vavilova, Yefim (the father of the Jewish family she is forced to stay with), and his family were boarding up the windows and doors to prepare for the White Army soldiers that were coming. In one shot, Yefim is nailing a beam across a window, perpendicular to another board which clearly makes the shape of a cross.

The other major example of religion that can be found in the film is when Vavilova travels to the priest, and then to where the synagogue had been. She does this in order to have her baby baptized, or recognized in the Jewish religion. This would not have sat well with Soviet censors, seeing a strong female Commissar traveling in search of someone to baptize her child. I found this scene particularly moving because it seemed that Vavilova simply asked the priest for directions, and would rather have had her baby brought up to be Jewish. This shows the positive impact that Yefim and his family had on Vavilova during her stay.

We are indeed fortunate to view this film at all as it was banned in 1967 for being both pro-Semitic and anti-Bolshevist. Thanks to the spirit of Glasnost its director Aleksandr Askoldov who had been barred from film-making during the intervening twenty years(!) was able to piece it together from various copies. Its status now as a masterpiece of the seventh art is indisputable.

The sweeping camerawork, cross-cutting, composition and powerful imagery call to mind earlier masters of Soviet cinema. Alfred Schnittke's score is by turns searing and tender whilst the performances of the three principal actors are simply superlative.

Nonny Mordyukova as Klavdia, the title character, is mesmerising. Although her physique limited the parts she was offered, she was quite rightly considered one of Russia's finest. She is matched by impish Rolan Bykov as Yefim the tinsmith and the splendid Raisa Nedashkovskaya as his wife Maria.

Those who have seen the film will recognise that there are certain scenes which the ideologists of the regime at that time could not countenance and by refusing to toe the party line and make his film less humanistic, Askoldov paid a heavy price for his courageous stance.

This masterwork at least survives as a testament to both his talent and strength of character.

The Russian film Komissar was shown in the U.S. with the translated title The Commissar (1967). It was co-written and directed by Aleksandr Askoldov. This film wasn't released until 1988, 21 years after it was produced. Not only were we deprived of the film, but Aleksandr Askoldov, the director, was never permitted to direct a movie again. The explanation for this delay, and this punishment, was that "the film depicted the Red Army in a negative way." That sounds realistic enough, until you see the movie. To me, the Red Army was depicted in a heroic fashion. There must have been subtle offenses, not clear to a non-Russian.

The movie is set in Ukraine, where the Red and White armies clashed in the Russian Civil War. Nonna Mordyukova portrays Klavdia Vavilova, a Red Army commissar, who is fighting against the Whites in the post-revolutionary war. She becomes pregnant, and is billeted with a Jewish family during her pregnancy.

Anti-Semitism lies just below the surface of the entire film. Both the Reds and the Whites were guilty of it, although I believe it was worse from the Whites at that time. We don't see actual pogroms during the movie. A synagogue is boarded up when the Whites take over the town, as are many houses. It wasn't clear to me whether these were all houses with Jewish families.

However, there's a horrific scene with three of the Jewish children terrify their own sister. They tell her to "come up out of the cellars," and then they "shoot her" with their toy weapons. Obviously, they are playing out a scene that they've witnessed.

The acting is outstanding throughout the film. Rolan Bykov plays the husband, Yefim. (It's interesting that Bykov himself was Jewish.) Raisa Nedashkovskaya plays Maria, Yefim's wife. Both Rykov and Nedashkovskaya are excellent actors. Yefim is a strange character--in some ways brave, and in some ways childish. He'd rather dance than work, and he'll break into song when one would least expect it.

Maria, his wife, is a more traditional role. The only problem with the casting is that Nedashkovskaya is incredibly beautiful. That would work if she were a young, newly married wife. However, the couple live in poverty, with many children to care for. Beauty doesn't last long in situations like that. Realistically, Maria would be worn down and broken by that point in her life. In the movie, she's still youthful and radiant.

The protagonist of the film, Klavdia Vavilova, is a loyal Communist and she is as brave and strong as any man in the movie. In fact, when she's having the baby, and she's told to push, she has a flashback to a moment when she and other soldiers are trying to push a heavy artillery caisson over a hill.

As a mother, with a newborn child, she is torn between her baby and her duty to the Red Army. Nonna Mordyukova, who portrays Klavdia Vavilova, was a great Soviet actor. She is excellent in this role. She looks like a strong, tough Ukrainian woman, who would not be out of place in the Red cavalry. Director Askoldov could probably have chosen a young beauty for the role of Klavdia. Instead, he went with an actor with broad shoulders and strong features. Mordyukova inhabits the role, and the movie's greatness is due in large part to her work.

We were very fortunate to see this film at Rochester's Dryden Theatre in the George Eastman Museum. The Dryden owns an excellent 35mm print, and seeing it projected on the large screen was a wonderful experience. However, it will work almost as well on a small screen. The Commissar is available on DVD. Don't miss it!