Hooptober XII | 14/31 | Decades 6/9 | 1910s | Former Soviet State | Silent Film
A reclusive young scholar named Andrei Bagrov reads by the fireplace. His aunt brings him food, but he is too engaged in his book. Andrei adored his now-passed mother, keeping a portrait of her over the mantle. His friend, Tsenin, with the aid of Andrei’s aunt, coerces Andrei to accompany him to Princess Taskaia’s home for a social engagement.
Tsenin drags Andrei around the party, introducing him to various guests. But Andrei becomes smitten when Zoia Kadmina arrives at the party. Too shy to engage in conversation, he watches her from afar. Zoia too watches Andrei, her black eyes meeting his. Overwhelmed, Andrei leaves the party and returns home.
The following day, Tsenin drops by again to invite Andrei out to a charity soirée. There, Zoia performs a monologue on stage. Tsenin offers to introduce Andrei to Zoia, but Andrei declines and leaves. Zoia writes him an anonymous letter, inviting him to meet her at Petrovskii Park. Andrei meets her at the park, but his aloofness infuriates Zoia, leading to their parting ways.
Three months pass, and Andrei reads in the newspaper about Zoia’s sudden passing after drinking poison over an unrequited love. The news sends Andrei into a depressive and obsessive spiral.
The cinematography makes a few stylistic choices: shooting from eye level, moving the camera to follow characters, staying at middle distance except for rare close-ups, such as when Andrei and Zoia exchange looks. Both Andrei and Zoia have deep black makeup around their eyes, sharing a depressive demeanor as kindred spirits, a common stylistic trope of the period.
Where the film is most creative is in its adaptation of Turgenev’s novella. The film adds dreams and ghostly apparitions that haunt Andrei, lengthening the source material to such a degree that many audiences found it off-putting. Director Yevgeni Bauer accepted these criticisms, claiming the weakness lay in the still-burging cinematic medium’s ability to capture “Turgenev’s delicate poetry.”
From a contemporary perspective, however, it’s choices like this that make silent films more enjoyable. Also, most literate audience members appreciate when a film takes liberties in a literary adaptation to enhance what is cinematic about the story. The changes transform the literary novella into a Gothic horror, resulting in something with greater staying power.
That isn’t to say anything negative about Turgenev. But with so few adaptations of Turgenev’s work and no films from the era surviving in their entirety except this one, it highlights the impact of Bauer’s creative liberties.
Though this film is 110 years old, made in a long-dead empire for a largely uncaring audience, it’s a surreal meditation on grief that still speaks today.