5 Soviet fairy tales directed by Alexander Ptushko, which you can watch ONLINE
His fantasy movies captivated millions. We’ve selected the most striking works of the famous Soviet director, frequently referred to as the ‘Soviet Walt Disney’.
1. ‘New Gulliver’ (1935)
This black-and-white movie based on the book about Gulliver's adventures in the Land of the Lilliputians is the world's first full-length movie made with the help of three-dimensional animation. According to the plot, a pioneer named Petya is transported to the country of Lilliput in a dream and becomes a participant in the uprising of local workers.
More than 1,500 dolls – inhabitants of Lilliput – were created especially for the movie. Moreover, many of them had special masks with different expressions of emotion, from joy to horror.
The actors had a hard time: they were forced to remain motionless for a long time, while filming the individual phases of the puppet characters’ movement. But, the result was stunning: the movie was shown as part of the Soviet program at the festival in Venice and purchased for distribution in the U.S., France and the Netherlands.
2. ‘Stone Flower’ (1946)
Ptushko was a pioneer in many ways, including the use of animation and combined filming. He also made the first Soviet color movie based on Pavel Bazhov's tales about the Ural Mountains.
The Mistress of the Copper Mountain offers Danila the Master in her underground kingdom to create a magnificent stone flower, indistinguishable from the living ones. And she hopes that he will forget his former life, where a bride awaits Danila.
In the filming pavilion, they made “stone halls” with moving scenery, which created the effect of the presence of the characters in the underground caves. At the festival in Cannes, the movie won the prize for the best color scheme.
3. ‘Sadko’ (1952)
The idea of making a movie about Sadko, an epic gusli player who goes on a journey to distant lands to look for the bird of happiness, came to the director during the filming of ‘The Stone Flower’. It turned out to be a perfect adventure movie with battles and fairy-tale characters like the enchanting Phoenix Bird. The movie’s visuals are subtly reminiscent of the paintings of Viktor Vasnetsov, the main storyteller of Russian painting. While the soundtrack contains music from Rimsky-Korsakov's opera ‘Sadko’. In 1953, the movie won the Silver Lion at the Venice Film Festival.
In the early 1960s, the movie, which, by then, had already been in the U.S. box office, was released there again. Director Roger Corman remounted it and released it as ‘The Magical Voyage of Sinbad’. Read about how Korman turned another Ptushko movie, ‘Sampo’, into a blockbuster for the U.S. box office here.
4. ‘Ilya Muromets’ (1956)
The first wide-screen Soviet movie tells the story of the epic bogatyr (hero), who protects the people from the Tugar raids. The movie is incredibly large-scale: it seems that the hordes of attackers are countless. To create this effect, a special device was used, which visually “multiplied” the army of invaders. As in ‘Sadko’, the motifs of Vasnetsov's fairy-tale paintings are easily recognizable here.
5. ‘Ruslan and Lyudmila’ (1973)
A screen adaptation of Pushkin's poem, an epic spectacle with magic and battles. Ptushko's last movie was characterized not only by its scope, but also by its incredible technical level. Many special devices for special effects were created for it. To make everything look authentic in the frame, an animal sculptor, a glassblower and an animator worked on the scenery. The director himself even made sculptures for the movie out of walrus tusk, coral, wood, shells and coconuts with his own hands.
