Movies for the Masses
Popular Cinema and Soviet Society in the 1920s

A pathbreaking study of Soviet cinema in the 1920s.

Denise J. Youngblood (Author)

9780521466325, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 26 November 1993

296 pages, 33 b/w illus. 8 tables
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.9 cm, 0.49 kg

'[Movies for the masses] is often provocative and stimulating. It is also well written, very readable and has a style that engages both the reader's attention and the intellect … It provides a wealth of statistical information … and will appeal to a broad spectrum of readers from politics, film and cultural studies … [It] is a 'good read' and you leave it knowing more about the period, as well as having your own arguments 'honed' by the new evidence and opinions provided.' Roger Powell, Drama

This book is a pathbreaking study of the 'unknown' Soviet cinema: the popular movies which were central to Soviet film production in the 1920s. Professor Youngblood discusses acting genres, the cinema stars, audiences, and the influences of foreign films and examines three leading filmmakers - Iakov Protazanov, Boris Barnet, and Fridikh Ermler. She also looks at the governmental and industrial circumstances underlying filmmaking practices of the era, and provides an invaluable survey of the contemporary debates concerning official policy on entertainment cinema. Professor Youngblood demonstrates that the film culture of the 1920s was predominantly and aggressively 'bourgeois' and enjoyed patronage that cut across class lines and political allegiance. Thus, she argues, the extent to which Western and pre-revolutionary influences, boureois directors and middle-class tastes dominated the film world is as important as the tradition of revolutionary utopianism in understanding the transformation of Soviet culture in the Stalin revolution.

Introduction
Part I. Contexts: I. A historical overview 'from below'
2. The entertainment or enlightenment debate
3. The inostranshchina in Soviet cinema
Part II. Practice: 4. Genres and hits
5. Images and stars
6. Iakov Protazanov, the 'Russian Griffith'
Part III. Alternatives: 7. Boris Barnet, Soviet actor/Soviet director
8. Fridrikh Ermler and the social problem film
9. For workers and peasants only - factory and tractor films
Conclusion.

Subject Areas: 20th century history: c 1900 to c 2000 [HBLW], European history [HBJD]