Connoisseurs will rejoice at the discovery of fragments from a lost work by Yevgeny Bauer (1865-1917), the greatest Russian director of his age. Scholar Anna Kovalova has identified in the Bologna collection two (mostly decomposed) reels from an Italian distribution print of the Bauer thriller Pochoždenija Špejera i ego šajki “červonnych valetov. Now, while Italian films from the 1910s – comedies, diva films and colossal productions such as Quo vadis? – were exported worldwide, resulting in prints resurfacing in South America, Holland and Japan, it is quite extraordinary to find a trace of a pre-revolutionary Russian film distributed in Italy. A celebrated director; a historically interesting print – two good reasons to preserve fragments that are in bad shape. There is a third, and maybe the best reason: the real-life Son’ka zolotaya ruchka, a fascinating female master thief and con artist of undying fame in Russia, who inspired the film character Son’ka Golden Hand. Charming Sheindl Solomoniak, AKA Sofia Blyuvshtein (1846?-1902) would rob jewellery stores in daylight, hotel rooms in the early morning and bankers as they slept, after having become friendly with them in Odesa’s Café Fanconi. The thieves of St. Petersburg elected her queen and when arrested, she invariably managed to escape by seducing the guards. A popular idol in her lifetime, after her death she was immortalised in fiction, realm of Babel’s gangster king Benya Krik. The first serial starring Son’ka Golden Hand was produced in 1914 by Alexander Drankov; more adaptations followed, the most recent being a Russian TV series (2007). Criminals worship Son’ka in Moscow at what they believe is her grave, and in a part of the web that ignores the current Russian attacks on Odesa, tourists can book online a tour dedicated to legendary criminals in the Moldavanka; it includes a visit to the site of a thieves’ school run by the incomparable Son’ka.

 Mariann Lewinsky

In 1922, Lenin decreed not only a liberalisation of the economy (NEP), but also the promotion of non-Russian cultures (Korenizatsiya) to stabilise the shaky Soviet Union. Ukrainian cinema flourished under the state monopoly VUFKU (Vse-Ukrainske Foto Kino Upravlinnia – All-Ukrainian Photo Cinema Administration), which began production in Odesa in 1922 and later opened more studios in Kyiv and Kharkiv. Four scripts by Isaak Babel were adapted by VUFKU: Sil (Salt, Petro Chardynin, 1925, lost), Mandrivni Zori (Wandering Stars, Hryhori Hrycher-Cherykover, 1926, lost), Benya Krik (Vladimir Vilner, 1926) and Dzhimmi Higgins (Jimmy Higgins, Heorhi Tasin, 1928, lost, except for a fragment). Many great classics of Soviet cinema are Ukrainian VUFKU productions, among them Ljudyna z kinoaparatom (Dziga Vertov and Yelizaveta Svilova, 1929) or Arsenal (1928) and Earth (1930) by Oleksandr Dovzhenko. Today, Dovzhenko is considered a representative of Ukraine’s modernist Renaissance. In the comedy Jahidka kohannja, his second work and the earliest one still existing, parental and gender roles are treated in a refreshing burlesque manner. Most of the social progresses of the early Soviet Union were reversed in the mid-1930s by a conservative family policy (see Tsirk), with abortion and homosexuality now criminalised and divorce made difficult. The nationality policy and with it VUFKU had already been terminated in 1930, which was followed by Stalin’s campaigns to exterminate the Ukrainian culture, peasants and writers alike.

Mariann Lewinsky

During his time in France, in the early days of the talkies, Eisenstein partially completed a short film entitled Romance sentimentale, one of the earliest attempts at audiovisual construction. The nuts and bolts of this construction, which for him was the ultimate expression of cinematic art, went on to command his full attention from then onwards. But we will forget this failed attempt, which he abandoned to his assistant, Alexandrov, following several decidedly tempestuous days of shooting. The film was sponsored by the singer Mara Giry (or her representative), and the lady wanted to be seen and to be heard. She is seen at the piano, weeping as she contemplates the rain – cue mournful music. Oh, Eisenstein’s mimicry of the sobbing mistress of the arpeggio, as she cooed, distraught over her lost love – it was hilarious. He told me after abandoning the film: “Tissé and I shot some pleasing autumnal images in keeping with the romantic, sentimental tone of the music. They fit the bill perfectly, but the rest… schmaltz.” Indeed it was: a piano set among the clouds, white greyhounds, garlanded flowers and lighting flashes to the sound of crashing cymbals.

Jean Mitry, S. M. Eisenstein, Éditions Universitaires, Paris 1956

At the end of this short film, troops once again stride down the Odesa steps, ten years after Bronenosets Potyomkin. But these naval cadets, all clad in white, are singing happily and appear to dance like a musical chorus; children and young people rush towards them laughing; Soviet power has healed all wounds and brought sunshine and happiness. Odesawas directed by Frenchman Jean Lods, co-founder of the revolutionary Ciné-club des Amis de Spartacus in 1928 (and later of the IDHEC) who stayed for three years, 1934-1937, in the Soviet Union where he made Odesa, apparently in collaboration with Isaac Babel; very likely the two knew each other from Paris. Babel, who spoke excellent French (and had written his youthful works in French), made several long journeys to the west; in 1927-28 he was in Berlin, in Paris with his emigrated wife, in Brussels with his sister and mother; in 1933 he visited his wife and daughter in Paris and, in April 1933, Maxim Gorky in exile in Sorrento. On this occasion he mentioned to Gorky a proposal from French film producers for a film about the double agent and revolutionary Asef and actually worked on the project for some time. In 1935, he got permission to travel to Paris for a last time and participated at the First International Writers’ Congress for the Defence of Culture, organised by Ilya Ehrenburg, Malraux and Gide. The appeal launched by this meeting of 250 writers from 38 countries has a sinister echo today: “Faced with the threats to culture in many countries, several writers had taken the initiative to organise a congress to discuss and evaluate the means of defending culture.”

Mariann Lewinsky