"Inconvenient" director: Why the creator of "White Sun of the Desert" Vladimir Motyl was not allowed to make films

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

10 years ago, on February 21, 2010, the famous film director Vladimir Motyl passed away. His works Zhenya, Zhenechka and Katyusha, White Sun of the Desert, and The Star of Captivating Happiness have become classics of Soviet cinema. For 45 years of creative activity, he shot only 10 films. There could have been much more of them if the filmmakers did not interfere with his work, because he had to defend each of his films with battle …

In addition to acting education, Vladimir Motyl also had a historical one - he made films mainly on historical themes and believed that this knowledge was simply necessary in his work. Interest in history was also explained by personal motives - the director believed that the twentieth century milled the fate of his ancestors. Vladimir's grandfather, a Belarusian peasant who raised seven children, was dispossessed and exiled to the Far East. His father, a Polish émigré, was arrested on charges of espionage and sent to a camp in Solovki, where he died a year later. Mother, a sister of mercy, who participated in the civil war on the side of the Bolsheviks, after her husband's arrest, was exiled to the Urals for 15 years. There Vladimir spent his childhood. He said that this era lived in him from childhood all his life.

Of all the entertainment in the remote northern regions, there was only a mobile cinema, and Vladimir watched all the films that were brought to them, to the holes. Since then, his dreams of cinema have not let go. After graduation, he left for Moscow and applied to VGIK. He managed to successfully pass two rounds, and he skipped the third - he met his first love and forgot about the time. After that, he returned to Sverdlovsk, where he graduated first from the theater institute, and then from the history department of the university.

Almost all the works of Vladimir Motyl were subjected to merciless criticism. Even at the stage of discussing the script, his idea was not approved by the film leadership, and the shooting of the film was postponed or even prohibited. It happened when the director was going to shoot a picture about the Decembrist Küchelbecker based on “Kühle” by Tynyanov. The management considered this idea dangerous and recommended Motyl to look for another topic. Then he decided to make a film about the Great Patriotic War, but at the same time leave the main character as the same awkward and eccentric dreamer. From here the genre of heroes-lyrical comedy was born. However, the very idea of making a comedy about the war seemed blasphemous to the leadership, and they tried to ban the film as denying the heroism of Soviet soldiers. It was released only as the "third screen", but nevertheless it enjoyed incredible success among viewers, and especially among front-line soldiers - it was watched by 24.5 million people. But the director had serious problems after that.

Years later, Vladimir Motyl said: "".

Two years later, another masterpiece by Vladimir Motyl appeared on the screens, which brought him all-Union popularity - "The White Sun of the Desert". Then the director was saved by Grigory Chukhrai, who headed an independent experimental studio, who entrusted Motyl with the shooting of a new film, telling him that this was a chance for him to rehabilitate himself. But history repeated itself again: the shooting was difficult, the director was accused of being unfit for professionalism and condemned for a plot that was too romantic for a revolutionary story, at the editing stage it was necessary to cut out a large number of episodes, and they wanted to send the finished film to the shelf.

The director of "Mosfilm" did not sign the act of acceptance of the picture, but its fate was decided by a lucky chance: the film was watched and approved by Brezhnev himself, and only after that "White Sun of the Desert" was released. Then it was watched by 35 million viewers, it became a real mascot of Soviet cosmonauts - before each launch they revised it, and years later the director said: "".

Years later, Motyl returned to the theme of the Decembrists - when he shot the film "The Star of Captivating Happiness". For him, this plot was a kind of continuation of the history of his family, and some episodes were autobiographical. Once his mother went to the transfer point for prisoners in order to see her husband there for even a minute, but this never happened: "". These events became the prototype of the failed meeting of Polina Gebl with her husband, Ivan Annenkov, before he was sent to hard labor.

The director did not manage to shoot a single film without overcoming serious obstacles. Despite the enormous success of his work with viewers, the authorities openly did not recognize Motyl and seemed to constantly remind him that he should take permission to make a movie as a great favor. The second wife of the director, actress Raisa Kurkina said: "".

In the script for the film "Star of Captivating Happiness" there was an episode where Emperor Nicholas I appears on the palace stairs, but in the original interiors - the Winter Palace and Peterhof - he was strictly forbidden to shoot. The situation was saved by the fact that "White Sun of the Desert" had a large number of fans who were ready to help their beloved director, even at the risk of themselves. This turned out to be the director of the Hermitage, Boris Piotrovsky. When Vladimir Motyl and Vasily Livanov in the tsar's uniform appeared in his office, he said with a smile that he could not refuse the emperor himself, and gave the go-ahead for shooting in the halls of the Hermitage. Funding for this film was cut in half - in the hope that the director would refuse, but he finished the work anyway.

Only in 1992, Vladimir Motyl received the first official title - Honored Artist of the RSFSR, and the state prize for "White Sun of the Desert" was awarded to him 30 years after the film was released on the screen! The director's dedication to his work admired his colleagues - despite all the obstacles, he remained internally free. Natalya Bondarchuk, who played Princess Volkonskaya in "The Star of Captivating Happiness", said about him: "".

There are many interesting moments behind the scenes of this film: The romantic mystery of the "Stars of Captivating Happiness".