Chris Marker - The Last Bolshevik (1993)

[Thorkell A. Ottarsson]

This was a brilliant documentary about Aleksandr Medvedkin, the
director of one of the best Soviet Union silent film, Happiness.
Happiness was banned because it depicted the horrors of Stalinism and
how the farmers suffered.

Chris Marker was Medvedkin's friend and this film is a letter to his
dead friend. Marker does not try to make an angel out of Medvedkin. He
shows us how a man who believed in Communism but could not lie would
suffer and never get anywhere.

But this documentary is so much more than a film about Medvedkin. It
is a film about the Russian nation and the horrors of communism. Keep
in mind, Marker was a leftist, which makes his honesty in this film
even more admirable.

Like all of Marker's films this is also a poetic film, both visually
and in narration. A masterpiece!

This was a great month. I loved going through the films of Marker! He
really is one of the best!

Thorkell