Belye tuchi (1968) - full transcript
Alexander Dovzhenko Film Studio
The First Creative Association
The White Clouds
based on the novel by A. Sizonenko
Script:
Alexander Sizonenko
Directed by Rollan Serhienko
Cinematography:
Mikhail Belikov
Production Design:
Mikhail Rakovskiy
Music: Valentin Silvestrov
Sound: N. Avramenko
S. Serhienko
Assistant Director: Yu. Tupitskiy
Cameraman: V. Zimovets
Costumes: N. Kibalchich
Make up: Ye.Parfeniuk
There was once a summer,
Editing: T. Sivchikova
Continuity: L. Chumakova
There was once a summer,
And then winter came
Assistants of Director:
R. Balayan, V. Georgienko
Assistants of Cinematographer:
V. Hapchuk, P. Pastukhov
Assistant of Designer:
A. Boyko
No adventure ever turned up then
And there's nothing still
Stunts Cameraman: P. Korol
Stunts Designer: M. Polunin
An ox-cart driver got sick
He got sick and lies ailing
State Symphonic Orchestra
of the Ukrainian SSR
Conductor:
V. Kozhukar'
No-one's going to ask him
Producer: Aleksei Yarmolskiy
What is wrong with him
Cast:
Father - Yuriy Dubrovin
Son - Yuriy Nazarov
as a child - Vanya Yurchik
Arms are hurting,
legs are hurting
Head is hurting
Andreev - L. Noreyko
Lutsenko - V. Alekseenko
Small children are left behind,
Supporting roles: V. Volkov,
K. Donets, L. Zornik,
M. Kavka, V. Kondratyuk,
A. Salamatina
And a young wife.
Small children are left behind...
The journey will be
long,
across the whole Ukraine,
and sad.
About Father's death.
Sooner or later
everyone takes this journey.
This is one of those journeys
that happen without our willing.
It can be short,
just a few steps,
it can be long,
thousands of kilometers,
but still, it is equally hard.
The telegram was
like a verdict:
Your father is dying,
come at once.
And here I am, on my way.
I wish one never had to...
But even though it's very hard,
very difficult,
the hope still lingers.
Maybe, everything
will turn out fine?
Maybe...
Father, probably
during these days and nights
of loneliness and sickness
you have thought over
your whole life.
I will also remember
everything on the road.
I'll remember everything.
Everything.
From behind a rocky mountain
Doves are flying
I've never known any luxury
while my years are passing
Oh, go and harness horses,
the raven-black horses
And let us set out and chase
the years of youth
Do you remember those treks?
It seems to me
that it had never happened.
That we have invented it all
ourselves.
Those roads,
and the ox-cart trading,
and our youth.
Have we ever been young, huh?
Have we?
Of course!
People are not born old!
Son, you better run,
invite old Lutsenko.
Rich people don't need us
and we don't need them.
Let's drink, Sasha.
The way things are now,
we are not to sit together
at one table with them anymore.
All right,
we need people to look after
horses and cattle.
Appoint me!
And me!
And me too!
This won't do.
You can't all work at a stable.
You better tell us
how are we going to manage the rains.
Guys here
have heard a song, but got it all wrong.
When I was in the Navy
I heard that they
made a kind of button, and
when you push it
it rains cats and dogs.
If it's true or not -
that I don't know.
It's not so easy.
How'd it used to be?
Well,
one person had a small
plot of wheat,
getting ripe.
And he didn't need rain.
While the other
had a plot with melons.
Rain was most welcome there.
You can't please everyone.
If there was
more rain in our parts,
we'd have everything.
And a dozen tractors.
What can I say...
The understanding of
collective farming
was naive
almost idealistic,
but full of high hopes
for a happy future.
Hello, Sasha!
Are we having a meeting?
Good evening.
You've sent a plan
impossible for me to fulfill.
Have you decided to dispossess me?
I guess we will, Mr Borys.
Sasha, lad!
How am I a wealthy peasant?
Sasha,
you know...
What are you doing?
You got rid of horses...
Do you think you're equal with God?
No, Sasha.
God, he's far.
You won't get him
with your bare hands.
Your God is so far
that he's not there at all...
People without God know nothing...
and without land they're lazy...
without their land,
their own...
They won't love it.
They won't.
The land will be ours,
common to all
and easier to work on together.
Well, well...
You'll take away my land
and you'll work it better than me?
We will.
There will be tractors.
The state will give
all these super-phosphates...
Never will anyone look after my land
the way I do.
Never.
No one will love it the way I do.
They will.
Oh you... will they?
You'll see, Sasha.
Love for the land will vanish.
The land will become barren
and people will curse you.
Sasha...
What people?
Are these people?
We'll see who'll be cursed.
The land will produce, have no doubts.
It produced before you,
and after you it will produce,
and even better.
It will keep producing
year after year
as maybe it has never done before.
The land of our parents
and grandparents,
our greatest joy and pride,
our dear land.
And it seems that
it hears everything,
knows everything,
contains everything.
It also knows of your grief.
Otherwise why would it be
so solemnly quiet,
contemplative,
and melancholic,
this land of yours?
How he got his possessions -
it is no business of ours.
We have to be decisive
when answering the question
if he's a rich peasant
to be dispossessed or not.
Of course he is.
He found that treasure
during Nicholas's reign.
If not us, then who?
Together we dispossessed the Stepko,
the Musienko and the Vedmid families.
What about now?
And now,
Mr Oleksandr,
are you going to support rich peasants?
You know that I am
not supporting rich peasants.
I dispossessed the Stepko, the Musienko
and the Vedmid families.
While now...
All our lives we've lived
like good neighbours.
In the hard years he used
to help us out with wheat,
he lent us a horse...
He saved my wife
in those times.
Sasha, we have to.
We need to go.
There's nothing to be done.
We need to go, that's it.
We know well
how he used to help you.
As if you didn't
slave hard to repay it!
Should we erect a monument to honor him
for saving your wife?
Sasha, you came too?
We came to dispossess you.
I've dispossessed myself already.
- What do you mean? Have you sold
everything? - No!
I have simply prepared myself
for your visit.
What do you think?
That I don't see
what's going to happen?
I see everything,
it's crystal clear to me.
Your horses, cows, tools,
all of it is here?
Everything.
Even the smallest thing.
Here you go, these are the keys
to the pantry,
the basement,
the barn.
Let's go.
No, I won't.
Sasha, your father,
Mr Mykyta,
let him rest in peace,
used to run away from the backyard
when I was slaughtering a pig.
While now, brother,
this is more than a pig.
This is about your whole life.
Do you think that everyone
will hand you the keys like that?
That they will forgive you as I do?
No, Sasha...
They'll prepare a bullet for you
instead of keys.
Take care.
You're begging for it.
Remember that.
New things in life
always come with difficulty.
And you, Father,
many people didn't understand
you back then.
Lutsenko surely was among them.
It was hard for you
to dispossess him.
Good evening, Ustya, dear.
Come in.
Our antichrist took down
the icons again.
I don't need icons to see God.
/in Russian/ 'What causes fights
and quarrels among you?
Brothers, do not slander one another.
Anyone who speaks against a brother
or judges him
speaks against the law and judges it.
When you judge the law,
you are not keeping it.
Instead, you ought to say,
?If it is the Lord?s will,
we will live
and do this or that.?
As it is,
you boast of your arrogant schemes.
All such boasting is evil.
If anyone,
then,
knows the good they ought to do
and doesn?t do it,
it is a sin for them.
Now listen, you rich people,
weep and wail
because of the misery
that is coming to you.
Your wealth
has rotted...
I was looking at Ustya,
at her dark veil,
and I was racking my brains
what kind of wealth had to rot
to cause Ustya so much grief.
Andreev.
If simply, Mr Stepan.
If officially - a representative
of the Party's Central Committee.
Please, receive our guest!
Oh please, not so solemnly!
What do I need?
A piece of bread and a bowl
of beetroot soup for lunch.
And in the morning - some water
to wash myself. That's it.
I can sleep on straw
or near a stove.
I'm not hard to please.
Right, Cossack?
We need
to have a collective
farm's board meeting
and to estimate
how much grain we can take
from each collective farmer.
Mostly wheat.
And I will deal
with the mid-level peasants,
who haven't joined
the collective farm yet.
If we manage to convince them,
Mr Oleksandr,
we'll be half way done with our task.
How should we feed our children?
This is the same as it used to be:
we are without bread, without anything...
We have nothing!
Children are starving.
Please understand,
workers in factories
have nothing to eat.
Who will work when hungry?
Who will build?
How should our state live
without bread?
We don't have enough cars,
machines, tractors.
At times we don't have
them at all.
What can one do in production shops
without machines
and in the fields
without tractors?
The only way out
is to buy them from abroad
with our bread.
Our fathers and grandfathers
ploughed with horses,
sowed, thrashed grain.
We'll get by without
machines somehow.
BREAD FOR PLANTS AND FACTORIES
AGRICULTURAL MACHINERY FOR VILLAGES
/in Russian/ Is it not written:
?My house will be called
a house of prayer for all nations'
But you have made...
Ustya, don't come to us
with your Bible.
Don't perplex my family.
There's nothing scary.
See!
Don't be afraid
Never be afraid of anything!
I tell my son not to be afraid,
while I am in doubt.
- You're talking about grain?
- No, about land.
Will they love it
the way Borys Lutsenko loved it?
They won't, Sasha.
They won't.
Not the way he did.
And there's no need for it.
This love can go to blazes!
If owning a plot of land
means constant toil
and selling out one's brother...
We are fighting such a love, Sasha.
We set up collective farms
to this end. You understand this yourself!
Don't stand in one place!
Run around!
Go!
He'll grow up
and such doubts
won't even occur to him!
Oh you!
While parents are still alive
they stand on all of your roads.
They wait for you
and look out for you.
Life is somehow organized
in such a manner,
that the longer we live
the greater the distances that spread
between us and our parents.
It is frightening to think
that no one is there.
Only a vale is left,
and unthinkable expanse of the world
and life.
THROUGH COOPERATIVES - TO SOCIALISM
Comrades!
We have done everything
that we could
to help our brother workers
and their children
during this hard winter.
We have also helped
the state with our bread.
And this is the law.
Because now it is impossible
to live secluded
in one's own house,
in one's own yard.
Now everyone and all of us
are in charge of the whole country.
If someone is experiencing tough times
we will help them out of trouble.
The whole collective farm
will come to help.
This is the source of our strength.
If the state is in need,
if such is a requirement of
the political moment and economy,
we give everything to our Motherland.
We will give everything
the way you, villagers,
gave your bread!
Deliver your bread,
a present to the Motherland,
and all the best in your lives!
And once again, thank you comrades!
At the time I didn't understand
your elation, Father.
And I regret this,
and I envy you, even now,
from the great distance
of years and events.
Because you were so proud then.
I have never been able
to be as proud,
neither of my deeds
nor of my friends.
We're waiting for you.
I see.
Why are you frowning
on such a sunny day?
What happened?
- People came from the town, brought us
a new plan to fulfill. - An advanced one.
It gives us no reason for merriment.
Show it, Peter.
Have a look.
- Who brought it?
- Pylyp Vukhatyi did.
Him? Impossible!
Not only will this plan leave our
collective farm and people without bread,
but who brought it?
The son-in-law of a dispossessed person!
Well, let's go...
- Good afternoon
- Hi
I've heard that you came
to collect grain for the State.
Why so late?
It was not easy for us here.
You could've helped,
if you had come in time.
And now there's nothing
left for you to do here.
We've fulfilled the plan.
We've just dispatched a red caravan
to the station.
So go to other villages,
there's nothing for you to do here.
How come?
That's how.
Take your plan
and make yourself scarce!
Do I make myself clear?
- He is delegated by the Regional
Party Committee. - And I am delegated...
by the Central Committee.
- That's it
- No, it's not
I am also delegated,
- And I will insist...
- Who are you?
Maybe like Vukhatyi here,
one of the former rich peasants?
I represent the
District Party Committee.
- I fought during the Civil War...
- Then you'll immediately leave this place
I follow the directives here.
So please, try banging your little fists
at someone else. Do you understand?
I am accountable here for everything
to the Party and to the local people,
and I will not stand your intrusion.
Now this is really all.
Goodbye.
You will not get away with this.
What should we do?
Run things!
They can shout at us
as much as they want,
bang their fists,
but we need to work,
complete our tasks.
And even though the truth
was on Andreev's side
they managed to get their way.
Because for them the most important thing
was not a difficult and important case
but their hurt pride.
Just don't cry.
Don't cry.
No need for that.
Do you hear me?
Why have they taken him?
I'm going there to help him out
of the predicament.
Maybe I'll manage to do
something for him.
And you, never cry!
Never.
Remember that.
Whatever happens.
I remembered our conversation
for the rest of my life.
And in the hardest moments
when it was impossible
to keep from crying
I recalled your words
and never cried.
Oh, brother, you're
all dressed up!
But I called you here to work!
And so I rushed.
And I am ready
to work with you at once.
Not in such a suit!
Sasha, we are to drive cattle
to lands 200 km from here.
So you need to change immediately.
What cattle?
No need to change!
Well, you know, back then they...
didn't keep me long.
They've sent me here
to set up a tractor depot.
And my first official document
was a telegram to you.
So join in,
we'll be together.
Thank you.
Handle me as you wish.
I knew with whom I was dealing.
This is how it should be.
Never put your personal grudges
above things of state importance.
Andreev came to the village
as if from the other world
of which you dreamt, Father.
Of which you heard
from the greatest wonder
of those times -
a crystal radio receiver.
You have loved Andreev
as your brother.
You still love him.
It's a pity that due to your
natural virtue and reserve
you didn't tell him.
He, however, surely felt it.
Hey-ho!
Where to?
I felt neither dead nor alive
among this bellowing, suffocating herd.
And you were smiling...
Do you see how beautiful the city is?
Just look! Have a look.
Life in the city is good.
Right, girls?
Maybe it is.
Probably.
There are no cows there.
There's nothing for us to do there.
And you smiled,
while your eyes were very sad.
Big cities and strange melodies
haunted and lured you
your whole life
in the dreamlike silence
of the steppe.
All right.
Dad, how did you know
that there would be no rain?
Rain?
How did I know?
What did I know?
How did you know
that there would be no rain?
Ah...
Well, listen.
Rain falls here only from
white, round clouds.
Can you remember that?
Only from white, round ones.
Even if they are far away,
they will come.
This very wind will bring them,
the south wind.
That's a helluva wind!
It blows so softly...
as if whispering some
tender words.
That's the wind, the special wind.
Your whole life, Father, you studied
the sky as though reading a book.
But back then I didn't understand
what you were telling me
about rains, winds and clouds.
It seemed to me that the rains
were falling on their own,
while winds were blowing
the way they wanted.
Haven't you seen a tractor yet,
really?
- I was at school then.
- Come on. Let's have a look
Get in.
There you go.
Up a little, like that.
Sit down.
See here,
a lever.
And here - a gearbox.
And what's that?
For gasoline.
Remember, Yurko,
this thing
will change our whole life.
Hold on tight!
Who will people curse now?
Are they people even?
A gang!
What a gang!
To deport everyone to Solovki!
All of them should've been
destroyed!
And we were pampering them,
we were sparing them!
Whose are you?
Fedora's maybe?
Yes. My mother's name was Fedora.
My goodness. You look old.
But still, I recognized you.
I'd recognize all of you.
I've remembered you all,
little rascals.
You used to hang out on the
threshing floor, always fiddling there.
Hungry.
Pallid. Skinny.
And I used to scold you all the time,
to shout at you
until the moment
the supervisors looked away.
And then I would pour grain
in your pockets.
What you did with it afterwards
I don't know...
We fried it.
You were also holding up
your pockets, right?
I was.
I was pouring and putting
the grain in your pockets
and looking at you.
I remember all of you.
I remember Tolya Korol,
he had very shallow pockets.
Where is he now?
He fell during the war.
And Vasya Yudin, I used to
pour him some grain too.
He was as black as a beetle
and all bones.
I haven't seen him
for a long time.
Vasya shot himself during
the occupation, in 1943.
I see.
I've forgotten everyone.
And everyone else forgets us.
Even our own children.
I've been alone my entire life.
Yes.
Lonesome...
When I am at my guard-post
I reminisce
about everything:
about when I got married,
the songs we used to sing,
the trees,
the melon fields we used to have.
Oh, there used to be
such fine melon fields!
And the trees were high.
People were beautiful.
All of them were like my relatives...
Why is that so?
Huh?
They were your peers, Grandma.
And now everyone is younger
than you,
and all of your peers have died.
I used to live for the sake of my children
and to be virtuous for them.
I should've behaved differently.
The children grew up, each found a partner
and now live on their own.
And me, my entire life I've worked
as a guard,
recalling you all.
Peter Kyyok often used to
get it right in the neck.
He was mean.
As obstinate as his father.
Where is Petro now?
Fell at the Dniester river.
What about Vitya Mytrofaniv?
Blown up by a tank
near Koenigsberg.
How many of you have fallen,
woe on me...
Why have so many of you fallen?
Such was the war, Grandma.
Violent.
As if you don't know...
Violent?
All of you went a really long way
from the village, didn't you?
And perished in places
hard to pronounce
and hard to remember.
So that is why I dream of all of you
when it's about to rain.
Dead people come to dreams
before the rain.
Families, kin come and go,
while the land
stays for eternity.
You can feel it best
when you are in the steppe.
And Father's death is perceived
here without fear,
without agitation and anxiety.
Here you understand that death
comes to everyone inevitably,
when their time is due.
Only not now,
not this moment, not this one!
My Father is not finished with
his orchard yet,
and I had no time
to tell him the most important thing.
The native village.
The roots of your family
and kin are here.
Here Father spent his youth.
Here he met Mother.
And Uncle Yevtukh blessed them,
so remarkably young
and remarkably beautiful.
But Uncle Yevtukh has not been with us
for quite some time already,
and no elders
are left in your family.
And you alone have to face
what's in store for you.
Maybe for this reason Father
comes across as very lonely.
Because his mother is no longer there,
neither is his wife,
nor Andreev.
There's only you,
and only you have to say something to him
in this difficult deathbed moment.
Wake up! Look who's come to see you.
Well... Do you see who's come?
No... I don't see.
My voice.
Do you recognize my voice?
Voice, you say.
It's a familiar voice.
Oh my.
What a familiar face.
It reminds me of someone,
but I'm not sure who.
I know, it's hard for you,
but I can't help you.
It's nasty stuff.
Be careful.
Don't touch anything here,
cause it will get on to you too.
You drove all night?
Well...
not all.
Yurko, my son.
My oh my, you suffered all night.
I didn't suffer.
If only you got better.
Mrs Lyubov can't come.
She's at a surgery.
That's fine.
My most important doctor arrived.
I need to give you an injection.
The procedure will take time,
meanwhile you can rest.
Yes, it's scheduled for today.
But I am better now.
I want nothing more than for you
to go home and to have some sleep.
My boy, please go.
Get some rest.
You'll come back in the evening.
Go see how things are,
in the house and in the garden,
where Mother used to walk.
It's been two months since I left.
Wife died May 1, 1950
Gave birth March 12, 1929
Planted 4 plums, planted 5 apples
Planted 2 cherries, 1 pear, 1 black cherry
August 1956 - renovation of the house
100 chickens June 8, smaller - June 21
Dad died January 23, 1934
Planted eggplants 16/IV
Planted courgettes 26/IV
Planted melon field on April 12
old style
2 pounds of wheat
2 pounds of corn...
Saint-Germain-des-Pres...
Such a beautiful name.
Or Montmartre...
Cyrano de Bergerac...
Oh, hell...
It's like pure music, it is.
Those damn French...
An interesting nation.
We fought hungry,
barefoot, barely clad.
And later we also suffered,
when rebuilding
what was destroyed by the war
and revolution.
We had no mercy for anything,
neither for us, nor for others.
I have worked all my life,
I was in a hurry,
24 hours were not enough for me.
My time has come, I feel it.
And the horses are without shoes.
They watch me go.
They wait for me to shoe them.
But I guess this isn't to be.
I feel bitter.
This weight sits so heavily that I don't
feel like dying when I consider all this,
and think
that I have no time
to finish anything.
You are my only hope.
You'll remain among people.
You'll do everything
that I haven't managed to.
Everyone thinks the same way
about their sons.
From behind a rocky mountain
Doves are flying
Are there clouds above the steppe?
Yes, there are.
Are they white and round?
Yes, Dad, they're white,
white and round.
And the birds,
are they flying over the windbreaks?
Yes, they are, they're flying.
Dad...
We will not go back
We will not go back
We have no one to return to
You had to appreciate us
as your own health
You had to appreciate us
as your own health
Yes.
This is my home.
Whatever happens to me,
wherever my destiny takes me,
my successes
or my failures,
my home was and still is
this village of melon fields, my Bashtanka,
an unremarkable village
in the infinite valley.
Be blessed and happy,
my native home,
my long-suffering Bashtanka,
my steppe dove.
I love you deeply as a son,
and as long as I love you
I'll be
a human being.
The End
The First Creative Association
The White Clouds
based on the novel by A. Sizonenko
Script:
Alexander Sizonenko
Directed by Rollan Serhienko
Cinematography:
Mikhail Belikov
Production Design:
Mikhail Rakovskiy
Music: Valentin Silvestrov
Sound: N. Avramenko
S. Serhienko
Assistant Director: Yu. Tupitskiy
Cameraman: V. Zimovets
Costumes: N. Kibalchich
Make up: Ye.Parfeniuk
There was once a summer,
Editing: T. Sivchikova
Continuity: L. Chumakova
There was once a summer,
And then winter came
Assistants of Director:
R. Balayan, V. Georgienko
Assistants of Cinematographer:
V. Hapchuk, P. Pastukhov
Assistant of Designer:
A. Boyko
No adventure ever turned up then
And there's nothing still
Stunts Cameraman: P. Korol
Stunts Designer: M. Polunin
An ox-cart driver got sick
He got sick and lies ailing
State Symphonic Orchestra
of the Ukrainian SSR
Conductor:
V. Kozhukar'
No-one's going to ask him
Producer: Aleksei Yarmolskiy
What is wrong with him
Cast:
Father - Yuriy Dubrovin
Son - Yuriy Nazarov
as a child - Vanya Yurchik
Arms are hurting,
legs are hurting
Head is hurting
Andreev - L. Noreyko
Lutsenko - V. Alekseenko
Small children are left behind,
Supporting roles: V. Volkov,
K. Donets, L. Zornik,
M. Kavka, V. Kondratyuk,
A. Salamatina
And a young wife.
Small children are left behind...
The journey will be
long,
across the whole Ukraine,
and sad.
About Father's death.
Sooner or later
everyone takes this journey.
This is one of those journeys
that happen without our willing.
It can be short,
just a few steps,
it can be long,
thousands of kilometers,
but still, it is equally hard.
The telegram was
like a verdict:
Your father is dying,
come at once.
And here I am, on my way.
I wish one never had to...
But even though it's very hard,
very difficult,
the hope still lingers.
Maybe, everything
will turn out fine?
Maybe...
Father, probably
during these days and nights
of loneliness and sickness
you have thought over
your whole life.
I will also remember
everything on the road.
I'll remember everything.
Everything.
From behind a rocky mountain
Doves are flying
I've never known any luxury
while my years are passing
Oh, go and harness horses,
the raven-black horses
And let us set out and chase
the years of youth
Do you remember those treks?
It seems to me
that it had never happened.
That we have invented it all
ourselves.
Those roads,
and the ox-cart trading,
and our youth.
Have we ever been young, huh?
Have we?
Of course!
People are not born old!
Son, you better run,
invite old Lutsenko.
Rich people don't need us
and we don't need them.
Let's drink, Sasha.
The way things are now,
we are not to sit together
at one table with them anymore.
All right,
we need people to look after
horses and cattle.
Appoint me!
And me!
And me too!
This won't do.
You can't all work at a stable.
You better tell us
how are we going to manage the rains.
Guys here
have heard a song, but got it all wrong.
When I was in the Navy
I heard that they
made a kind of button, and
when you push it
it rains cats and dogs.
If it's true or not -
that I don't know.
It's not so easy.
How'd it used to be?
Well,
one person had a small
plot of wheat,
getting ripe.
And he didn't need rain.
While the other
had a plot with melons.
Rain was most welcome there.
You can't please everyone.
If there was
more rain in our parts,
we'd have everything.
And a dozen tractors.
What can I say...
The understanding of
collective farming
was naive
almost idealistic,
but full of high hopes
for a happy future.
Hello, Sasha!
Are we having a meeting?
Good evening.
You've sent a plan
impossible for me to fulfill.
Have you decided to dispossess me?
I guess we will, Mr Borys.
Sasha, lad!
How am I a wealthy peasant?
Sasha,
you know...
What are you doing?
You got rid of horses...
Do you think you're equal with God?
No, Sasha.
God, he's far.
You won't get him
with your bare hands.
Your God is so far
that he's not there at all...
People without God know nothing...
and without land they're lazy...
without their land,
their own...
They won't love it.
They won't.
The land will be ours,
common to all
and easier to work on together.
Well, well...
You'll take away my land
and you'll work it better than me?
We will.
There will be tractors.
The state will give
all these super-phosphates...
Never will anyone look after my land
the way I do.
Never.
No one will love it the way I do.
They will.
Oh you... will they?
You'll see, Sasha.
Love for the land will vanish.
The land will become barren
and people will curse you.
Sasha...
What people?
Are these people?
We'll see who'll be cursed.
The land will produce, have no doubts.
It produced before you,
and after you it will produce,
and even better.
It will keep producing
year after year
as maybe it has never done before.
The land of our parents
and grandparents,
our greatest joy and pride,
our dear land.
And it seems that
it hears everything,
knows everything,
contains everything.
It also knows of your grief.
Otherwise why would it be
so solemnly quiet,
contemplative,
and melancholic,
this land of yours?
How he got his possessions -
it is no business of ours.
We have to be decisive
when answering the question
if he's a rich peasant
to be dispossessed or not.
Of course he is.
He found that treasure
during Nicholas's reign.
If not us, then who?
Together we dispossessed the Stepko,
the Musienko and the Vedmid families.
What about now?
And now,
Mr Oleksandr,
are you going to support rich peasants?
You know that I am
not supporting rich peasants.
I dispossessed the Stepko, the Musienko
and the Vedmid families.
While now...
All our lives we've lived
like good neighbours.
In the hard years he used
to help us out with wheat,
he lent us a horse...
He saved my wife
in those times.
Sasha, we have to.
We need to go.
There's nothing to be done.
We need to go, that's it.
We know well
how he used to help you.
As if you didn't
slave hard to repay it!
Should we erect a monument to honor him
for saving your wife?
Sasha, you came too?
We came to dispossess you.
I've dispossessed myself already.
- What do you mean? Have you sold
everything? - No!
I have simply prepared myself
for your visit.
What do you think?
That I don't see
what's going to happen?
I see everything,
it's crystal clear to me.
Your horses, cows, tools,
all of it is here?
Everything.
Even the smallest thing.
Here you go, these are the keys
to the pantry,
the basement,
the barn.
Let's go.
No, I won't.
Sasha, your father,
Mr Mykyta,
let him rest in peace,
used to run away from the backyard
when I was slaughtering a pig.
While now, brother,
this is more than a pig.
This is about your whole life.
Do you think that everyone
will hand you the keys like that?
That they will forgive you as I do?
No, Sasha...
They'll prepare a bullet for you
instead of keys.
Take care.
You're begging for it.
Remember that.
New things in life
always come with difficulty.
And you, Father,
many people didn't understand
you back then.
Lutsenko surely was among them.
It was hard for you
to dispossess him.
Good evening, Ustya, dear.
Come in.
Our antichrist took down
the icons again.
I don't need icons to see God.
/in Russian/ 'What causes fights
and quarrels among you?
Brothers, do not slander one another.
Anyone who speaks against a brother
or judges him
speaks against the law and judges it.
When you judge the law,
you are not keeping it.
Instead, you ought to say,
?If it is the Lord?s will,
we will live
and do this or that.?
As it is,
you boast of your arrogant schemes.
All such boasting is evil.
If anyone,
then,
knows the good they ought to do
and doesn?t do it,
it is a sin for them.
Now listen, you rich people,
weep and wail
because of the misery
that is coming to you.
Your wealth
has rotted...
I was looking at Ustya,
at her dark veil,
and I was racking my brains
what kind of wealth had to rot
to cause Ustya so much grief.
Andreev.
If simply, Mr Stepan.
If officially - a representative
of the Party's Central Committee.
Please, receive our guest!
Oh please, not so solemnly!
What do I need?
A piece of bread and a bowl
of beetroot soup for lunch.
And in the morning - some water
to wash myself. That's it.
I can sleep on straw
or near a stove.
I'm not hard to please.
Right, Cossack?
We need
to have a collective
farm's board meeting
and to estimate
how much grain we can take
from each collective farmer.
Mostly wheat.
And I will deal
with the mid-level peasants,
who haven't joined
the collective farm yet.
If we manage to convince them,
Mr Oleksandr,
we'll be half way done with our task.
How should we feed our children?
This is the same as it used to be:
we are without bread, without anything...
We have nothing!
Children are starving.
Please understand,
workers in factories
have nothing to eat.
Who will work when hungry?
Who will build?
How should our state live
without bread?
We don't have enough cars,
machines, tractors.
At times we don't have
them at all.
What can one do in production shops
without machines
and in the fields
without tractors?
The only way out
is to buy them from abroad
with our bread.
Our fathers and grandfathers
ploughed with horses,
sowed, thrashed grain.
We'll get by without
machines somehow.
BREAD FOR PLANTS AND FACTORIES
AGRICULTURAL MACHINERY FOR VILLAGES
/in Russian/ Is it not written:
?My house will be called
a house of prayer for all nations'
But you have made...
Ustya, don't come to us
with your Bible.
Don't perplex my family.
There's nothing scary.
See!
Don't be afraid
Never be afraid of anything!
I tell my son not to be afraid,
while I am in doubt.
- You're talking about grain?
- No, about land.
Will they love it
the way Borys Lutsenko loved it?
They won't, Sasha.
They won't.
Not the way he did.
And there's no need for it.
This love can go to blazes!
If owning a plot of land
means constant toil
and selling out one's brother...
We are fighting such a love, Sasha.
We set up collective farms
to this end. You understand this yourself!
Don't stand in one place!
Run around!
Go!
He'll grow up
and such doubts
won't even occur to him!
Oh you!
While parents are still alive
they stand on all of your roads.
They wait for you
and look out for you.
Life is somehow organized
in such a manner,
that the longer we live
the greater the distances that spread
between us and our parents.
It is frightening to think
that no one is there.
Only a vale is left,
and unthinkable expanse of the world
and life.
THROUGH COOPERATIVES - TO SOCIALISM
Comrades!
We have done everything
that we could
to help our brother workers
and their children
during this hard winter.
We have also helped
the state with our bread.
And this is the law.
Because now it is impossible
to live secluded
in one's own house,
in one's own yard.
Now everyone and all of us
are in charge of the whole country.
If someone is experiencing tough times
we will help them out of trouble.
The whole collective farm
will come to help.
This is the source of our strength.
If the state is in need,
if such is a requirement of
the political moment and economy,
we give everything to our Motherland.
We will give everything
the way you, villagers,
gave your bread!
Deliver your bread,
a present to the Motherland,
and all the best in your lives!
And once again, thank you comrades!
At the time I didn't understand
your elation, Father.
And I regret this,
and I envy you, even now,
from the great distance
of years and events.
Because you were so proud then.
I have never been able
to be as proud,
neither of my deeds
nor of my friends.
We're waiting for you.
I see.
Why are you frowning
on such a sunny day?
What happened?
- People came from the town, brought us
a new plan to fulfill. - An advanced one.
It gives us no reason for merriment.
Show it, Peter.
Have a look.
- Who brought it?
- Pylyp Vukhatyi did.
Him? Impossible!
Not only will this plan leave our
collective farm and people without bread,
but who brought it?
The son-in-law of a dispossessed person!
Well, let's go...
- Good afternoon
- Hi
I've heard that you came
to collect grain for the State.
Why so late?
It was not easy for us here.
You could've helped,
if you had come in time.
And now there's nothing
left for you to do here.
We've fulfilled the plan.
We've just dispatched a red caravan
to the station.
So go to other villages,
there's nothing for you to do here.
How come?
That's how.
Take your plan
and make yourself scarce!
Do I make myself clear?
- He is delegated by the Regional
Party Committee. - And I am delegated...
by the Central Committee.
- That's it
- No, it's not
I am also delegated,
- And I will insist...
- Who are you?
Maybe like Vukhatyi here,
one of the former rich peasants?
I represent the
District Party Committee.
- I fought during the Civil War...
- Then you'll immediately leave this place
I follow the directives here.
So please, try banging your little fists
at someone else. Do you understand?
I am accountable here for everything
to the Party and to the local people,
and I will not stand your intrusion.
Now this is really all.
Goodbye.
You will not get away with this.
What should we do?
Run things!
They can shout at us
as much as they want,
bang their fists,
but we need to work,
complete our tasks.
And even though the truth
was on Andreev's side
they managed to get their way.
Because for them the most important thing
was not a difficult and important case
but their hurt pride.
Just don't cry.
Don't cry.
No need for that.
Do you hear me?
Why have they taken him?
I'm going there to help him out
of the predicament.
Maybe I'll manage to do
something for him.
And you, never cry!
Never.
Remember that.
Whatever happens.
I remembered our conversation
for the rest of my life.
And in the hardest moments
when it was impossible
to keep from crying
I recalled your words
and never cried.
Oh, brother, you're
all dressed up!
But I called you here to work!
And so I rushed.
And I am ready
to work with you at once.
Not in such a suit!
Sasha, we are to drive cattle
to lands 200 km from here.
So you need to change immediately.
What cattle?
No need to change!
Well, you know, back then they...
didn't keep me long.
They've sent me here
to set up a tractor depot.
And my first official document
was a telegram to you.
So join in,
we'll be together.
Thank you.
Handle me as you wish.
I knew with whom I was dealing.
This is how it should be.
Never put your personal grudges
above things of state importance.
Andreev came to the village
as if from the other world
of which you dreamt, Father.
Of which you heard
from the greatest wonder
of those times -
a crystal radio receiver.
You have loved Andreev
as your brother.
You still love him.
It's a pity that due to your
natural virtue and reserve
you didn't tell him.
He, however, surely felt it.
Hey-ho!
Where to?
I felt neither dead nor alive
among this bellowing, suffocating herd.
And you were smiling...
Do you see how beautiful the city is?
Just look! Have a look.
Life in the city is good.
Right, girls?
Maybe it is.
Probably.
There are no cows there.
There's nothing for us to do there.
And you smiled,
while your eyes were very sad.
Big cities and strange melodies
haunted and lured you
your whole life
in the dreamlike silence
of the steppe.
All right.
Dad, how did you know
that there would be no rain?
Rain?
How did I know?
What did I know?
How did you know
that there would be no rain?
Ah...
Well, listen.
Rain falls here only from
white, round clouds.
Can you remember that?
Only from white, round ones.
Even if they are far away,
they will come.
This very wind will bring them,
the south wind.
That's a helluva wind!
It blows so softly...
as if whispering some
tender words.
That's the wind, the special wind.
Your whole life, Father, you studied
the sky as though reading a book.
But back then I didn't understand
what you were telling me
about rains, winds and clouds.
It seemed to me that the rains
were falling on their own,
while winds were blowing
the way they wanted.
Haven't you seen a tractor yet,
really?
- I was at school then.
- Come on. Let's have a look
Get in.
There you go.
Up a little, like that.
Sit down.
See here,
a lever.
And here - a gearbox.
And what's that?
For gasoline.
Remember, Yurko,
this thing
will change our whole life.
Hold on tight!
Who will people curse now?
Are they people even?
A gang!
What a gang!
To deport everyone to Solovki!
All of them should've been
destroyed!
And we were pampering them,
we were sparing them!
Whose are you?
Fedora's maybe?
Yes. My mother's name was Fedora.
My goodness. You look old.
But still, I recognized you.
I'd recognize all of you.
I've remembered you all,
little rascals.
You used to hang out on the
threshing floor, always fiddling there.
Hungry.
Pallid. Skinny.
And I used to scold you all the time,
to shout at you
until the moment
the supervisors looked away.
And then I would pour grain
in your pockets.
What you did with it afterwards
I don't know...
We fried it.
You were also holding up
your pockets, right?
I was.
I was pouring and putting
the grain in your pockets
and looking at you.
I remember all of you.
I remember Tolya Korol,
he had very shallow pockets.
Where is he now?
He fell during the war.
And Vasya Yudin, I used to
pour him some grain too.
He was as black as a beetle
and all bones.
I haven't seen him
for a long time.
Vasya shot himself during
the occupation, in 1943.
I see.
I've forgotten everyone.
And everyone else forgets us.
Even our own children.
I've been alone my entire life.
Yes.
Lonesome...
When I am at my guard-post
I reminisce
about everything:
about when I got married,
the songs we used to sing,
the trees,
the melon fields we used to have.
Oh, there used to be
such fine melon fields!
And the trees were high.
People were beautiful.
All of them were like my relatives...
Why is that so?
Huh?
They were your peers, Grandma.
And now everyone is younger
than you,
and all of your peers have died.
I used to live for the sake of my children
and to be virtuous for them.
I should've behaved differently.
The children grew up, each found a partner
and now live on their own.
And me, my entire life I've worked
as a guard,
recalling you all.
Peter Kyyok often used to
get it right in the neck.
He was mean.
As obstinate as his father.
Where is Petro now?
Fell at the Dniester river.
What about Vitya Mytrofaniv?
Blown up by a tank
near Koenigsberg.
How many of you have fallen,
woe on me...
Why have so many of you fallen?
Such was the war, Grandma.
Violent.
As if you don't know...
Violent?
All of you went a really long way
from the village, didn't you?
And perished in places
hard to pronounce
and hard to remember.
So that is why I dream of all of you
when it's about to rain.
Dead people come to dreams
before the rain.
Families, kin come and go,
while the land
stays for eternity.
You can feel it best
when you are in the steppe.
And Father's death is perceived
here without fear,
without agitation and anxiety.
Here you understand that death
comes to everyone inevitably,
when their time is due.
Only not now,
not this moment, not this one!
My Father is not finished with
his orchard yet,
and I had no time
to tell him the most important thing.
The native village.
The roots of your family
and kin are here.
Here Father spent his youth.
Here he met Mother.
And Uncle Yevtukh blessed them,
so remarkably young
and remarkably beautiful.
But Uncle Yevtukh has not been with us
for quite some time already,
and no elders
are left in your family.
And you alone have to face
what's in store for you.
Maybe for this reason Father
comes across as very lonely.
Because his mother is no longer there,
neither is his wife,
nor Andreev.
There's only you,
and only you have to say something to him
in this difficult deathbed moment.
Wake up! Look who's come to see you.
Well... Do you see who's come?
No... I don't see.
My voice.
Do you recognize my voice?
Voice, you say.
It's a familiar voice.
Oh my.
What a familiar face.
It reminds me of someone,
but I'm not sure who.
I know, it's hard for you,
but I can't help you.
It's nasty stuff.
Be careful.
Don't touch anything here,
cause it will get on to you too.
You drove all night?
Well...
not all.
Yurko, my son.
My oh my, you suffered all night.
I didn't suffer.
If only you got better.
Mrs Lyubov can't come.
She's at a surgery.
That's fine.
My most important doctor arrived.
I need to give you an injection.
The procedure will take time,
meanwhile you can rest.
Yes, it's scheduled for today.
But I am better now.
I want nothing more than for you
to go home and to have some sleep.
My boy, please go.
Get some rest.
You'll come back in the evening.
Go see how things are,
in the house and in the garden,
where Mother used to walk.
It's been two months since I left.
Wife died May 1, 1950
Gave birth March 12, 1929
Planted 4 plums, planted 5 apples
Planted 2 cherries, 1 pear, 1 black cherry
August 1956 - renovation of the house
100 chickens June 8, smaller - June 21
Dad died January 23, 1934
Planted eggplants 16/IV
Planted courgettes 26/IV
Planted melon field on April 12
old style
2 pounds of wheat
2 pounds of corn...
Saint-Germain-des-Pres...
Such a beautiful name.
Or Montmartre...
Cyrano de Bergerac...
Oh, hell...
It's like pure music, it is.
Those damn French...
An interesting nation.
We fought hungry,
barefoot, barely clad.
And later we also suffered,
when rebuilding
what was destroyed by the war
and revolution.
We had no mercy for anything,
neither for us, nor for others.
I have worked all my life,
I was in a hurry,
24 hours were not enough for me.
My time has come, I feel it.
And the horses are without shoes.
They watch me go.
They wait for me to shoe them.
But I guess this isn't to be.
I feel bitter.
This weight sits so heavily that I don't
feel like dying when I consider all this,
and think
that I have no time
to finish anything.
You are my only hope.
You'll remain among people.
You'll do everything
that I haven't managed to.
Everyone thinks the same way
about their sons.
From behind a rocky mountain
Doves are flying
Are there clouds above the steppe?
Yes, there are.
Are they white and round?
Yes, Dad, they're white,
white and round.
And the birds,
are they flying over the windbreaks?
Yes, they are, they're flying.
Dad...
We will not go back
We will not go back
We have no one to return to
You had to appreciate us
as your own health
You had to appreciate us
as your own health
Yes.
This is my home.
Whatever happens to me,
wherever my destiny takes me,
my successes
or my failures,
my home was and still is
this village of melon fields, my Bashtanka,
an unremarkable village
in the infinite valley.
Be blessed and happy,
my native home,
my long-suffering Bashtanka,
my steppe dove.
I love you deeply as a son,
and as long as I love you
I'll be
a human being.
The End