Kira Muratova: 5 Film Collection (1967-1989) (5 Blu-ray)

Short Encounters / Long Farewells / Among the Gray Stones / Change of Fate / Asthenic Syndrome

Kira MURATOVA is one of the most important Soviet filmmakers of the 20th century. Radical and unclassifiable, several of her films were censored in the USSR for their freedom of tone and formal singularity.

This unique box set contains five restored, rarely screened films that are essential for discovering Kira Muratova's formal and thematic uniqueness. Each of the selected works illustrates a key moment in her cinema.

Brief Encounters (1967)
Having left her native village, Nadya and her friend go to a big city. On the way, the girl gets a job in a tea shop and meets Maxim, a young geologist, a talented and educated man. In general, he had all the virtues that are necessary in such situations, but... he had a beloved woman who lived in the city and was waiting for him in her house. It is to this very house that Nadya, in love and looking after Maxim, arrives. It so happened that Valentina Ivanovna warmly welcomed the girl and invited her to stay and look after the household - she herself holds a fairly high position in the city administration, loves her job and devotes a lot of time and energy to it.

The Long Farewell (1971)
Sasha was the meaning of her life. Now that her son had grown up, she had more free time and allowed the sensitive Nikolai Sergeyevich to look after her. After her son's summer trip to his father, she began to notice changes in Sasha. Secretly reading a letter from his father, she learned that her son wanted to leave.

Among the Gray Stones (1983)
A strange atmosphere, a bizarre string of fleeting but vivid human images, a kaleidoscope of individual and collective values, the front side of existence and the back side of experiences, parallels and intersections of a child's and an adult's view of the world, the polyphony of life and death - something that cannot be said, but which can be penetrated...

Change of Fate (1987)
"Change of Fate" is based on the story "Note" by S. Maugham, the action of which takes place in the mid-20s in Singapore (then the capital of the English colony of Malaya). However, the plot and text of the story are nothing more than a framework for the film, if any thoughts of the writer are heard in the polyphony of this picture, then only as one of the melodies. In general, the film is dominated by K. Muratova, her emotions, observations, reflections, aesthetics, understanding of the human soul, society, civilization, life. The film was created according to the principle when "the action takes place everywhere and nowhere, always and never." For this, even the English names of the main characters are replaced with "supranational" ones, and the rest of the characters are made nameless. From the wise acceptance of life in all its manifestations in the early films, in "Change of Fate" the director comes to the statement of the incurable imperfection of the world, where moral guidelines are lost and only moral mutants survive. "The Parable - in Reverse" (about the triumph of evil over good) is dedicated to the general problems of modern civilization.

Asthenic syndrome (1989)
The film consists of two short stories. The heroine of the first story is a woman who recently buried her husband and is in a state of depression, sometimes turning into aggression. The hero of the next story is a school teacher who, as a result of work and personal troubles, develops asthenic syndrome - the man falls asleep in the most inappropriate situations.