Video Americain

Synopsis

Nikita Mikhalkov is the most honored working director in Russia, who chronicles his country's history with a novelistic depth of detail and emotion. Winner of the Best Foreign Film Oscar for Burnt by the Sun, he is a major figure in the storied history of Soviet and Russian cinema.

The Films of Nikita Mikhalkov: Volume 1 includes:

A Slave of Love (1976)
While awaiting the arrival of her missing co–star husband on the set of a Russian film, silent film diva Olga (Yelena Solovey) becomes enmeshed in a romance with handsome young cameraman Pototsky (Rodion Nahapetov). But what begins as a casual dalliance becomes an awakening as Olga’s lover reveals his true allegiance.

Five Evenings (1979)
This adaptation of Aleksandr Volodin's comedy-drama stage play throws wistful nostalgia into kitchen–sink reality. Reunited after 17 years, a couple struggles to rekindle their still gestating romance with neither the mature bond of trust nor the blind hope of youth to guide them.

Oblomov (1980)
Based upon the classic novel by Ivan Goncharov, Oblomov follows the travails of I. I. Oblomov (Oleg Tabakov), a good–natured and indolent elite landowner with the mind of a reasonable man and the ambition of a giant slug.

Without Witness (1984)
While watching TV at home alone, a woman (Irina Kupchenko) receives a visit from her now remarried ex–husband (Mikhail Ulyanov). As banalities about old friends, old times, and their absent teenage son give way to increasingly confrontational verbal barbs, the threadbare camouflage of hospitality and cheap nostalgia masking the couple’s raw wounds and harsh agendas is ripped away.

Burnt by the Sun (1994)
Winner of the 1994 Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, it is the powerful story of a Soviet hero (Nikita Mikhalkov) whose family is suddenly targeted by Stalin's secret police. A colonel's summer in the country with his daughter and in–laws turns into an indelible account of a man's political paranoia.