WOMAN WITH A MOVIE CAMERA CONSTRUCTS The Constructs series examines the ways in which the things we make change both our world and how we understand it. Authors in the series explore the constructive nature of the human artifact and the imagination and reflection that bring it into being. Series Editors H. Randolph Swearer Robert Mugerauer Vivian Sobchack WOMAN with a MOVIE CAMERA Marina Goldovskaya Translated by Antonina W. Bouis Foreword by Robert Rosen University of Texas Press Austin Copyright © 2006 by the university of texas press All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America First edition, 2006 Requests for permission to reproduce material from this work should be sent to: Permissions University of Texas Press P.O. Box 7819 Austin, TX 78713-7819 www.utexas.edu/utpress/about/bpermission.html The paper used in this book meets the minimum requirements of ansi/niso z39.48-1992 (r1997) (Permanence of Paper). Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Goldovskaia, Marina Evseevna. [Zhenshchina s kinoapparatom. English] Woman with a movie camera : my life as a Russian filmmaker / Marina Goldovskaya ; translated by Antonina W. Bouis ; foreword by Robert Rosen. — 1st ed. p. cm. — (Constructs) isbn-13: 978-0-292-71464-9 (cloth : alk. paper) isbn-10: 0-292-71464-5 (cloth : alk. paper) isbn-13: 978-0-292-71343-7 (pbk. : alk. paper) isbn-10: 0-292-71343-6 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Goldovskaia, Marina Evseevna. 2. Motion picture producers and directors—Soviet Union—Biography. 3. Motion picture producers and directors—Russia (Federation)— Biography. 4. Women motion picture producers and directors—Soviet Union—Biography. 5. Women motion picture producers and directors—Russia (Federation)—Biography. I. Title. II. Series. pn1998.3.g645a3 2006 791.4302'32092—dc22 [b] 2006009472 To my parents THIS PAGE INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK Contents Foreword by Robert Rosen ix Acknowledgments xi Introduction 1 Father 15 Childhood 18 Our House 22 Bolshevo 28 Those Times 32 I Will Be a Camerawoman 36 Where to Next? 45 Lessons of Television 51 Teaching 54 The Weavers 58 My First Film Portrait 65 Professional Infatuations 68 Them 73 The Ordeal 83 Compromises 91 Sharp Angles 96 On the Threshold of Change 100 Arkhangelsk Muzhik 107 Oleg Efremov 121 Solovki Power 124 Life Is More Talented Than We Are 157 viii woman with a movie camera Perestroika: Another Life 162 A Taste of Freedom 168 Once More about Scripts 177 Earthquake 180 The House on Arbat Street 183 Life with a Camera 194 Technology and Creativity 198 The Prince 202 On Ethics 213 Life with a Camera (Continued) 216 Documentary Trip 218 Filmography of Marina Goldovskaya 227 Appendix: Notable Figures in Soviet Filmmaking and Other Arts 233 Index 255 Foreword i first met Marina Goldovskaya during the period of perestroika in the Soviet Union when I was part of a delegation of scholars sent to Moscow to negotiate formal cultural relations between our two countries in the field of film studies. Here was a filmmaker whose courageous documentary films on past abuses of power were hailed as nothing less than events of nationwide im- portance. She was a woman who had climbed to the top of her field in a male- dominated television industry, and a film artist who wrote scholarly books em- bodying the much-vaunted but seldom-achieved ideal of uniting theory and practice. And, most of all, I met a gracious, generous, and articulate individual whose commitments and humanistic sensibilities came from the heart. I knew then that I desperately wanted Marina to come to ucla to build our documen- tary program, to teach our students, and especially to serve as a role model for what it means to be an engaged filmmaker. In retrospect I still cannot believe how profoundly lucky we are that this actually came to pass. As a maker of documentary films, Marina embraces a unique mixture of seemingly contradictory characteristics that are in fact complementary. Others may praise her work for different reasons, but, personally, what I admire most is the dialectical tension between a humanistic sensibility that is intensely per- sonal and a critical awareness that is broadly social. In The House on Arbat Street (1993), she manages to capture in their full integrity the beliefs and idio- syncratic personalities of a score of people who had lived in a large Moscow apartment building over a period of more than seventy-five years. But when integrated into the overall context of the film, these separate testimonies add up to a whole that is far greater than the sum of its parts—nothing less than a masterful summary of the history of the Soviet Union from its inception through its demise, with all of the tragic contradictions laid bare. The Prince Is Back (1999) is an intimate and sympathetic portrait of a blindly idealistic dreamer, restoring an abandoned ruin in the hope of reclaiming his prerevo- x woman with a movie camera lutionary family identity. But true to Marina’s dialectical agenda, the personal once again provides a window onto the social, in this instance a period of un- rest and street demonstrations when disquieting uncertainty about the future results in an escapist nostalgia for an irretrievable past. The Shattered Mirror (1992) may be Marina’s most unapologetically personal essay, focusing warmly on many of her dear friends, but what I took away from the film most of all was the vision of a woman with a movie camera braving danger in the streets of Moscow to record and, by her filmmaking, to protect Russia’s fragile hold on newfound political rights. I do not believe it is a coincidence that Marina selected Peter Sellars as the subject of her most recent film—a wildly creative, boundary-breaking theater director for whom artistic, humanistic, and ideo- logical objectives are inextricably intertwined. These same intriguing complexities define Marina as a person as well. Warmly personable, considerate, and exceptionally loyal to her friends, stu- dents, and colleagues, she also displays an iron-willed commitment to honesty and the integrity of her work. Over the years, I have seen her anguish about whether or not a particular shot did justice to the motivations of a person or the complexity of an event. I have witnessed the intensity of her quest for an underlying narrative thread that would tie hundreds of hours of footage into a coherent story, but never at the sacrifice of truth. I am proud to have known Marina Goldovskaya for more than a decade as friend, colleague, mentor, and film artist. A Woman with A Movie Camera will enable you to get to know her too. Her story is one worth telling. Robert Rosen Dean of the ucla School of Theater, Film, and Television Acknowledgments i want to express my deepest gratitude to the people without whom this book would not have been possible. In the first place, to the people who ap- pear in my films. They sparked the ideas for my films, and they inspired me. I cherish the memory of those who are not with us anymore. I am proud that their stories and their images will not be lost to history. I am grateful to my peers with whom I worked for many years: Marina Krutoyarskaya, my closest friend and composer, and her husband, Sasha Zai- tzev; Sasha Hassin, my sound engineer; Tanya Samoilova, my editor; Alex- ander Lipkov, Sergei Muratov, Yuri Bogomolov, Aleksei Gusev, and Masha Muratov; and many, many others. Their advice was always invaluable. I wouldn’t have written this book if not for my students, both in Russia and America. I felt the temperature of their interest when communicating with them, and this interest inspired me greatly. I hope that this book will help some young documentarians understand ‘‘the secrets’’ of our complex profession. My most sincere thanks go to the University of California, Los Angeles, and especially to the ucla School of Theater, Film, and Television, which be- came my home in the United States. Here I found a wonderful community of professors, staff, and students whose nourishing atmosphere gave me strength and support to adjust to completely a new life and work conditions. My very special thanks go to Vivian Sobchack, who believed in my work and supported me all the way through, and to Bob Rosen, Michael Heim, Roberto Peccei, Ivan Berend, and Maja Manojlovic. I will never forget their generous help. I am more than grateful to Nina Bouis. She was not only a brilliant trans- lator but also a wonderful adviser who became a friend for life. And of course my thanks go to my husband, George Herzfeld, for his pa- tience, tolerance, immeasurable help, and endless support. THIS PAGE INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK Introduction n September 11, I woke very early, thanks to jet lag. I had returned to Los Angeles from Moscow the night before. I sat down at my desk Oto jot a few notes, as usual. I was in a marvelous mood. Over the summer in Russia I had seen all my friends, spent two weeks in Borovsk, near Kaluga, and had filmed a lot—and I liked what I had filmed. The film was taking shape. Suddenly, my husband shouted from the bedroom, ‘‘Marina, come here! You wanted to hear the Orson Welles broadcast? I think they’re playing it.’’ He had turned on the radio while he did his exercises. Something incred- ible was on the air. I ran into the room and listened. No, it wasn’t Welles...although the sense of horror was probably what people experienced in 1938, when America al- most lost its collective mind, listening to the Mercury Theater’s radio version of H.