Taras Shevchenko (film)
Taras Shevchenko is a 1951 Soviet biopic about the Ukrainian artist Taras Shevchenko produced by Isaak Shmarukh, Vasili Lapoknish, with associate producers Aleksandr Alov, Vladimir Naumov, Grigori Malik-Avakian and Latif Faziyev, and written and directed by Igor Savchenko. The New York Times praised the acting of Sergei Bondarchuk.[1]
Taras Shevchenko | |
---|---|
Directed by | Aleksandr Alov Vladimir Naumov Igor Savchenko |
Written by | Igor Savchenko |
Starring | Sergei Bondarchuk Vladimir Chestnokov Hnat Yura Ivan Pereverzev |
Music by | Boris Lyatoshinsky |
Production company | |
Release date |
|
Running time | 118 minutes |
Country | Soviet Union |
Language | Russian Ukrainian |
Synopsis
Summer 1841. Lermontov is killed. The news of this arrives to a modest attic of the Saint Petersburg Academy of Arts, where lives and works the young artist and poet Taras Shevchenko. Growing up in a Ukrainian peasant family, knowing all hardships of serf life, Shevchenko in the years of study clearly identifies the meaning of true art, which is to serve the interests of the people. After graduating from the Academy, Shevchenko goes to Ukraine. The poems of Taras are imbued with love for the common people. Landowner-nationalists, liberal leaders of the Cyril and Methodius Brotherhood, try to "tame" the famous poet, but Shevchenko forever has made his choice; he is on the side of the people, their defender and crooner. Fiery freedom-loving creativity of Taras Shevchenko is known throughout Russia. Nicholas I exiles the poet to the distant Caspian fort where he is to serve as an ordinary soldier and is banned from writing or drawing. In the poet's difficult days he has the support of Ukrainian soldier Skobelev, Polish revolutionary Serakovsky, captain Kosarev and the major of the fortress, Uskov. For the sake of his release Chernyshevsky and Dobrolyubov are hard at work. And so, the sick and aged Shevchenko is finally free. Together with Chernyshevsky and Dobrolyubov, he dreams of a bright future of the motherland, when the Russian and Ukrainian peoples throw off the chains of slavery.
Awards
Sergei Bondarchuk won the USSR State Prize and the Best Actor Award at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival for his acting.[2]
Cast
- Sergei Bondarchuk as Taras Shevchenko
- Vladimir Chestnokov as Nikolay Chernyshevsky
- Nikolai Timofeyev as Nikolay Dobrolyubov
- Hnat Yura as Mikhail Shchepkin
- Ivan Pereverzev as Sigizmund Serakovsky
- Yevgeny Samoylov as Nikolay Speshnev
- Lavrentiy Masokha as Nikolay Kostomarov
- Pavel Shpringfeld as Panteleimon Kulish
- Aleksey Konsovsky as Vladimir Kurochkin
- Grigory Shpigel as Karl Bryullov
- Mikhail Nazvanov as Nicholas I of Russia
- Mark Bernes as captain Kosarev
- Dmitri Milyutenko as major Uskov
- Marianna Strizhenova as Agafia Uskova
- Mikhail Kuznetsov as soldier Skobelev
- Natalia Uzhviy as Yarina Shevchenko
- Alexander Khvylya as Lord Barabash
- Garen Zhukovskaya as Lady Barabash
- Gennadi Yudin as agitator
- Vyacheslav Tikhonov as representative of the St Petersburg youth