AELITA: QUEEN OF MARS (1924) ¢ ¢ ¢
D: Yakov Protazanov
Yuliya Sointseva, Nikolai Tseretelli, Nikolai Batalov,
Valentina Kuindshi, Igor Iliyinski, Konstantin Eggert,
Yuri Zavadisky, Aleksandra Peregonets, Pavel Pol
An early Soviet propaganda piece in the form of a science-fiction movie about a scientist working on a rocket formula that can take a spaceship to Mars. The Martian sequences look cool - "Metropolis" meets "The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari". The socialist melodrama that frames them is dreary. (The workers' paradise does not look like a place you'd want to live.) In the end, the scientist abandons his space-age research to serve the proletariat, a dubious choice in the context of the movie, but understandable if you're a filmmaker looking for the Politburo's seal of approval. Carry on, comrade.
