Cinema of the Soviet Thaw

Lida Oukaderova is Assistant Professor of Film Studies in the Department of Art History at Rice University.

• AcknowledgmentsIntroduction1. The Persistence of Presence: Soviet Panoramic Cinema2. Mimetic Passages: The Cinema of Mikhail Kalatozov and Sergei Urusevskii3. The Architecture of Movement: Georgii Danelia's I Walk the Streets of Moscow4. A Walk Through the Ruins: Larisa Shepitko's Wings5. The Obdurate Matter of Space: Kira Muratova's Brief EncountersConclusion: The Otherness of SpaceBibliographyFilmographyIndex

"This is a sophisticated and often fascinating look at five key films of the 1960s. . . . Lida Oukaderova brings a wealth of diverse theoretical perspectives to each of the chapters, from Metz to Irigaray, Benjamin to Lefebvre. But just as impressive are convincingly drawn links between these Soviet films and some of the most important West European works of the time."—Russian Review"The Cinema of the Soviet Thaw is an exciting contribution to the study of Soviet film, moving the field beyond institutional and historical questions. Likewise, those concerned with the aesthetic, ideological, and other facets of postwar cinemas, should greet it enthusiastically."—Film Quarterly"Recommended."—Choice"This book is doubly welcome. First, because it adds substantially to the slender and dispersed literature dealing with film as a spatial medium; and secondly, by offering a corrective to accounts of Soviet cinema that are still too often preoccupied with ideological readings of a limited number of well-known films."—Sight and Sound"Overall, Oukaderova offers a fresh view on Thaw cinema, connecting the visualization—technical, architectural, and material—of space with wider artistic trends, both in non-Soviet cinema and in visual arts. What is particularly impressive is Oukaderova's exact articulation of the camerawork and its manner of capturing the body in space. The book is well researched, drawing on archival documents pertainingto discussions of individual films, and working productively with theoretical frameworks. "—Slavic Review"[a] sophisticated work that[gives] us a new and much needed reading of Thaw cinema."—Lilya Kaganovsky, editor of Sounds, Speech, Music in Soviet and Post-Soviet Cinema"superior and innovative scholarship."—Alexander Prokhorov, author of Inherited Discourse: Paradigms of Stalinist Culture in Literature and Cinema of the Thaw