48th out of 50 in our Criterion box set, and put off because it looked depressing. Once again, my cowardice was misguided, as, although it definitely had poignant elements, it is primarily a road (well, rail) movie/love story, and not really much about the war in which it is set (WWII), although that periodically intrudes (much like in Forbidden Games). Also, despite being a Mosfilms production, this film is refreshingly un-propaganda-y, and in fact, I'm rather surprised it wasn't censored (I guess it came out during the comparative thaw of the Khrushchev era) because everybody who breaks the official rules is painted sympathetically, and the most weasley and obnoxious character is a stickler for them (well, only so that he can be bribed). If it propagandizes anything, it's simple decency, which needs more propagandizing if you ask me. Also, it's gorgeous to look at: lush black and white photography and absurdly photogenic leads. (Apparently this in itself was a break from standard Soviet protocol, whereby the individual should not be lauded above the collective.)
The film begins with a grey-haired woman standing on a road that winds as far as the eye can see through fields staring off at where it disappears over the horizon, as a voiceover informs us that this is the only road along which her son could return to his home village, but that he was killed in a foreign land and buried by strangers. Then the voice announces that this is the story of her son, told by his friends.
Next we flash back to our hero, who is a very young private in charge of telecommunications in the field, under fire. The older officer who's with him tries to run for it and is killed. Our hero (Alyosha Skvortzov, the actor playing whom was only 19) continues to relate what's happening until a tank literally bears down on him. At this point he legs it,
and we get the somewhat ludicrous image of him being followed by the tank, zigging as he zigs and so on (there's also a disorienting shot where the camera goes completely upside down). Finally he stumbles across an anti-tank gun and as the tank crests the ridge above him, he shoots it in the underside, destroying it. Then another tank rolls into view and he destroys that one, too. Back at base people can barely believe his achievements, but his commander wants to give him a medal. Alyosha requests that instead he be allowed to visit home, because his mother has written him that her roof is leaking and needs him to repair it. After some resistance, his commander is convinced,
and even gives Alyosha six days: 2 to journey there, 2 to fix the roof, and 2 to return.
On his way away from the front, after helping push a jeep out of the mud, he is asked to take a message for Pavlov to his wife, and then the whole troop rallies round their commander to browbeat him into giving Alyosha soap as a gift for the wife. After initial categorical refusal, he proves just as susceptible as Alyosha's commander and eventually hands over two huge cakes - the entire supply for the platoon.
Next, Alyosha hooks up with a one-legged soldier returning from the war, Vasya (who is also absurdly good-looking, only in a much more rugged way - imagine Charles Bronson's more handsome brother). Vasya, who clearly regards Alyosha as an annoying greenhorn, asks him to watch his suitcase while he sends a telegraph. The train arrives and Vasya has not returned, so Alyosha goes in search of him to find that he's slumped over the desk because he's decided to tell his wife he's not coming home, because, he says, she was always too good-looking for him, so that he was jealous, and now he can't saddle her with a cripple. However, the lady in charge of the telegraph shames him and orders him to return home to his wife who will be mad with worry. Then we get the first of many train trips, this time with Alyosha and Vasya surrounded by other soldiers, who joke around and have to be convinced of Alyosha's story of the tanks. Then we see a very affecting scene of Vasya's wife throwing herself into his arms (he was right, she is pretty stunning - that's the propaganda of this film) as Alyosha slinks off.
Alyosha's next journey is stowing away in a compartment of hay on an army train. I'm not sure why he has to stow away, and he's told that he can't by the officious little oik Gavrilkin, who swears that his lieutenant is an absolute beast and is only mollified by a bribe of a can of meat (that says "MEAT" in English on it!) Alyosha is hiding when he hears someone climbing into the car, and we have our heroine: the tiny and absurdly-long-haired Shura,
who is initially comically terrified of him, so much so that she throws her pack out of the car intending to leap after it before Alyosha stops her (the train is by then moving very fast). Of course they end up becoming very close, although it's chaste because Shura lies to him that she has a fiance she's returning to. At the first stop where Alyosha hops out to get a drink, Gavrilkin comes in and discovers Shura, and demands more bribing. Then his lieutenant shows up, and of course turns out to be very understanding... of everyone but the odious Gavrilkin.
"See?" he says ruefully - "a beast!"
At the next stop, Alyosha again gets out to get water,
while Shura sleeps, but is distracted by news from the front being transmitted over loudspeaker in the small town, so that the train leaves without him. He gets a ride from an exhausted woman
driving an ancient truck (and lucky for her, because he keeps having to get out and crank it or push it out of ditch) but arrives too late in the next station. Disconsolate (his pack, which contained a present for his mother among other things, was on the train) he is trudging into town when a small figure high on a bridge above him yells at him - Shura!
They pause to picnic and wash, at which point Shura asks about the soap and Alyosha remembers he has to deliver it, handily in the very town they are near. They find the Pavlov family building destroyed, but a kindly old lady tells them that Pavlov's father is in a shelter, while his wife is nearer by at a new address. On arriving, Shura and Alyosha quickly realize that she has a live-in male lover, so they leave, and Alyosha even doubles back to get the soap, which he then delivers to Pavlov Sr., and spins him a yarn about his Best Friend Pavlov (Sergei).
Then it's on to the next stop, which is Shura's. As they're saying goodbye Shura reveals that she doesn't have a fiance. She runs alongside the train as Alyosha travels on, and later he realizes that she was telling him she loved him and he makes as though to jump off the train before realizing he can't. The train is packed with Ukrainians (!) fleeing the carnage in their homeland, but they can't escape it fully, because the train is hit by German bombers, and Alyosha has to save as many people (not all) as he can. This means his only way to get home is first by raft and then by car, with nobody willing to pick him up, until one old geezer (who is clearly convinced he'll be punished if he picks up a soldier - perhaps to guard against deserting) thinks twice and comes back
and drives 10 km out of his way to take Alyosha back to his village. But he can only give Alyosha a couple of minutes, just long enough to hug his mother, because he's almost used up all six days. For a while there it looks like his mother will miss him, too. I admit, I was decidedly moist-eyed at the end. (Not so Jami, because she decided she couldn't face a war movie and was deep in David Copperfield.) A truly lovely little film. Definitely ranks higher than 48th out of 50.
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