The imperial trace : recent Russian cinema / Nancy Condee.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Condee, Nancy.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Motion pictures--Russia (Federation)--History.

Motion pictures.

Russia (Federation).

History.

Physical Description:

vi, 352 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Oxford ; New York : Oxford University Press, 2009.

Summary:

The collapse of the USSR seemed to spell the end of the empire, yet it by no means foreclosed on Russia's enduring imperial preoccupations, which began with the reign of Ivan IV and had extended over four and a half centuries. Examining a host of films from contemporary Russian cinema, Nancy Condee argues that we cannot make sense of current Russian culture without accounting for the region's habits of imperial identification. But is this something made legible through narrative alone-Chechen wars at the periphery, costume dramas set in the capital-or could an imperial trace be sought in other, more embedded qualities, such as the structure of representation, the conditions of production, or the preoccupations of its filmmakers? This expansive study takes up this complex question through a commanding analysis of the late Soviet and post-Soviet period auteurists, Kira Muratova, Vadim Abdrashitov, Nikita Mikhalkov, Aleksei German, Aleksandr Sokurov, and Aleksei Balabanov.

Contents:

1 Introduction: Custodian of the Empire 3

2 Cine-Amnesia: How Russia Forgot to Go to the Movies 49

3 Nikita Mikhalkov: European but Not Western? 85

4 Kira Muratova: The Zoological Imperium 115

5 Vadim Abdrashitov-Aleksandr Mindadze: A Community of Somnambulants 141

6 Aleksandr Sokurov: Shuffling Off the Imperial Coil 159

7 Aleksei German: Forensics in the Dynastic Capital 185

8 Aleksei Balabanov: The Metropole's Death Drive 217

9 Postscript 237.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 303-331) and index.

ISBN:

9780195366761

019536676X

9780195366969

0195366964

OCLC:

234175950