Chicago Tribune: Boris Barnet series reveals a neglected Russian talent
Bruce Calvert
Boris Barnet series reveals a neglected Russian talent
By Michael Wilmington
Tribune movie critic
Boris Barnet--the neglected Russian director being celebrated with a nine-film
retrospective at Facets Multimedia this week--is a rare and delightful
discovery, one of those world filmmakers almost unknown in the West yet who has
real treasures to offer.
Of the nine films on the Facets series "The Extraordinary Mr. Barnet," the seven
he directed reveal a lyric romantic humorist and a unique talent. He was perhaps
the finest director of movie comedy in the Russian silent and early sound
periods.
That, in fact, is Barnet's reputation in Russia and Europe. Originally an
actor-athlete (a boxer), he was swept up in the 1920s cinematic creative ferment
in Russian that inspired the early films of Sergei Eisenstein, Vsevolod Pudovkin
and Alexander Dovzhenko.
Pudovkin and Barnet actually started together as fellow actors and assistants in
Lev Kuleshov's cinema workshop, where Barnet played a handsome, two-fisted
American cowboy and Pudovkin a counter-revolutionary swindler in Kuleshov's wild
satire-comedy "The Extraordinary Adventures of Mr. West in the Land of the
Bolsheviks."
Barnet's own directorial debut was a charmer, "The Girl with the Hat Box," a
1927 romantic silent comedy about love and a lottery ticket. Quickly, he
revealed the gifts that made his reputation: a genius for comedy high and low, a
delight in the eccentricities of the Russian personality and a poetic touch with
landscapes and cityscapes. Those gifts flourished in silent classics until 1932
when he made "Okraina," a gently powerful anti-war drama that got him in hot
water with Stalinist censors, hampering his subsequent career.
Barnet's problems with Soviet censors were not unlike the hassles of American
directors with studio bosses and the Hays Code; at times, he was reduced to
making Marxist kitsch: collective farm musicals like the silly but entertaining
"Bountiful Summer" (1951). But in 1957, Barnet was discovered again in France by
no less a critic than Jean-Luc Godard, who loved both his '57 circus comedy "The
Poet, the Wrestler and the Clown" and a revival of his 1936 color seaside
romance "By the Bluest of Seas." "Seas" and the films above are all in the
series; "Wrestler," alas, is not.
Barnet could be called, without stretching, a Russian Leo McCarey. Like McCarey,
he understands people and has a knack for spontaneous comedy and cutting satire.
His best films are robust, generous, full of life and humor--as joyous as much
of the real life director's latter life was not. After making his last film,
"Whistle Stop" (1963), Barnet committed suicide in 1965, a sad last curtain,
considering the ageless delight his films still give us.
"Okraina" (star)(star)(star)(star) (Barnet, 1932). Like other great primitive
early sound films, "Okraina" casts a mesmerizing spell. Beginning with
provincial light comedy and ending in bleak tragedy, it's the story of a German
POW in a small Russian village during WW I, his relations with the villagers and
his entrapment, along with the Russians, in the bloody world conflict and
revolution consuming them. (In Russian and German, with English subtitles.) 7
and 9 p.m. Fri.
"By the Bluest of Seas" (star)(star)(star)1/2 (Barnet, 1936). Much admired by
the young French New Wave critic-directors (especially Godard and Rivette), this
blithe romantic comedy about two shipwrecked Caspian sailors, their rocky
rivalry and their pursuit of a hard-to-get island girl (Elena Kuzmina) is one of
the most visually sumptuous of all Barnet's films. Full of rapturous seascapes,
rolling sunlit waves and affectionate humor, "Seas" was originally in color. But
though this print is in black-and-white, it's still beautiful. (In Russian, with
English subtitles.) 3 and 6 p.m. Sat.
"The Extraordinary Adventures of Mr. West in the Land of the Bolsheviks"
(star)(star)(star) (Lev Kuleshov, 1924). Mr. West (Porfiry Podobed), a Harold
Lloyd look-alike who runs the American YMCA, travels to Moscow under the
delusion that Bolsheviks are beasts, but soon learns otherwise. Barnet plays
West's bodyguard, Cowboy Jeddie; the evil swindler feeding West's paranoia is
Pudovkin. Fast, breezy, full of amusing caricatures, wild slapstick, broad
satire and fascinating photography of 1924 Moscow, this is an oddball delight.
(Silent, with English intertitles and live piano accompaniment.) 3 p.m. Sun.
"The Girl with the Hat Box" (star)(star)(star)1/2 (Barnet, 1927). Barnet's debut
feature: a picturesque romantic comedy about a beautiful milliner (Anna Sten,
later a '30s Hollywood star), her hat box, a winning lottery ticket and the two
men who adore her. Full of wit and feeling; a lovely film. (Silent, with English
intertitles and live piano accompaniment.) 5 p.m. Sun.
"The House on Trubnaya Square" (star)(star)(star)(star) (Barnet, 1928). Barnet's
best-loved silent comedy is about servant girl Parasha (Vera Maretskaya) and her
political education--but it's far from didactic. The movie, with its physical
jokes and lively Moscow scenes, sparkles like early Capra or McCarey, especially
when Parasha, inspired by a play about Joan of Arc, rebels against her
employers. (Silent, with English intertitles and live piano accompaniment.) 7
p.m. Sun.
"Bountiful Summer" (star)(star) (Barnet, 1951). Silly post-war romantic musical
about a Ukrainian collective farm, a hotshot accountant who stirs things up, two
criss-crossing romances and assorted five-year plans. But Barnet hasn't lost his
lyrical touch; the landscapes and musical numbers are charming. (In Russian,
with English subtitles.) 7 and 9 p.m. Tue.
"The Outskirts" (star)(star)(star) (Pyotr Lutsik, 1989). Loosely inspired by
"Okraina," this morbid depiction of an old man's war in a distant village blends
eye-catching black-and-white cinematography with bizarre allegory and wounding
violence. A Chicago Film Festival prize-winner, its young director, Lutsik, died
at 40 of a heart attack. (In Russian, with English subtitles.) 7 and 9 p.m. Thu.
Also in the series: "Dark is the Night" (Barnet, 1945), 4:30 & 7:30 p.m. Sat;
"Alenka" (Barnet, 1961) 7 & 9 p.m. Mon.
"The Extraordinary Mr. Barnet" is presented in collaboration with Seagull Films
and with the assistance of the Russian State Film Archive and the Confederation
of Filmmakers Unions. Most films are in 35 mm.
Facets Cinematheque is at 1517 W. Fullerton Ave.; 773-281-4114.
Bruce Calvert
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Visit the Silent Film Still Archive
http://home.comcast.net/~silentfilm/home.htm
Remove the "xspam" to reply
Max Nineteennineteen
years ago, and both were delightful, the absolute highlights of the
festival (and maybe the moment I started thinking I really liked old
movies better than new ones at such events). Trubnaya Square has one
of the great pull-the-rug-out-from-under-the-audience moments in film
history.