Page 105 - Inside the Film Factory New Approaches to Russian and Soviet Cinema

86 DOWN TO EARTH: AELITA RELOCATED
was able to take to Germany and sell in order to raise funds for much-needed
materials and equipment. 23
But individual enterprise could not solve the problems of a whole industry and,
despite formal nationalisation, foreign investment in Soviet production was actively
24
sought in 1922 within the general strategy of NEP. The search proved
unsuccessful, except for WIR’s subsidiary, Aufbau, offering a 50 per cent
investment in a new joint venture, to be known as Mezhrabpom-Rus. WIR may
have hoped to infuse the hitherto conservative Rus studio with ‘ideological rigour’,
but it was also clearly relying on Rus’s unique–in the Soviet context–capability to
produce films which might make their way in domestic and foreign markets. An
indication of Aleinikov’s priorities and enterprise is provided by the terms of the
script competition announced in September 1923 (with a jury headed by
Lunacharsky in his capacity as chairman of the Artistic Council of Russfilm, as the
company had now become):

The theme may reflect the past and present of revolutionary and old-world
Russia or contemporary life in either a realistic or a romantic treatment. But
we do require fullness of content, clarity and entertainment in the plot, drawn
in cheerful and wholesome tones, complexity of action unfolding within the
framework of the beauties of nature, and a variety of experiences for the
heroes. 25

The list of suggested themes included in the advertisement offers a valuable insight
into the generic possibilities and perceived needs as they appeared to Russfilm on
the brink of its expansion:

1. the Russian folk epic
2. historical and epic tales with a heroic flavour
3. the everyday life of the workers and peasants past and present
4. contemporary everyday life (other than workers’ and peasants’)
5. modernised daily life
6. the everyday life of Nepmen
7. adventure films and films of everyday life ‘on a USSR-wide scale’
8. wholesome revolutionary detective films
9. utopian films, such as a look into a happier future.

Aelita, as the new company’s first prestige production, would actually combine no
fewer than six of these themes in a novel imbrication, as if seeking to define the
studio’s whole field of operations and establish its distinctive approach to both
conventional and controversial subjects.
But Aelita was not in fact the first production to emerge from the new enterprise.
One week before its release, Four and Five [Chetyre i pyat’, 1924] was reviewed in
Pravda as a film ‘coming from Rus, the organ of Mezhrabpom’, in terms which
established the pattern of response that would apply to many subsequent