All language subtitles for Nikolaï Izvolov - Medvedkine & Vertov.eng

You would think that artists

of such calibre

would be fairly intimate,

and would exchange ideas
about their work.

Yet none of the documents,
witnesses

or personal archives
make any mention of this.

It's odd,

seeing as they lived
in the same building.

But I believe

there's a simple explanation
for this.

Their respective biographies
and filmographies

paint an interesting picture.

They moved
into the same building in 1937.

Let's see what
their relationship was before this.

In the early 1920s, Vertov,
a major theoretician and filmmaker,

was the most famous figure

of documentary cinema,
with Kino Pravda.

At the time,
Medvedkin was just

a propaganda worker
in the Red Army,

in Budyenny's 1st Cavalry Army.

Until 1926
he wasn't active in film.

He must have seen Vertov's films,

but the two men couldn't have met.

When Medvedkin

left propaganda for cinema
in 1927,

it was to go
to Gosvoyenkino Studios,

which was an offshoot
of the Army Ministry,

the "Army Department",
as it was called.

Vertov worked for other studios,

the two directors
weren't neighbours,

so they couldn't have met
in the evening or at work.

There couldn't have been
any contact.

Vertov was already in conflict

with the management
of Moscow's studios.

In 1928 he went to the Ukraine,
where he made The Eleventh Year

and his famous
The Man with a Movie Camera.

So they were very far apart
geographically.

At the beginning of the 1930s,
Vertov was in Moscow,

and Medvedkin was in charge
of the film-train,

travelling across country,

and was never in Moscow.

On his return,

he joined Mosfilm,
made Happiness,

and became secretary
of a Party committee,

a function
which required his presence.

Vertov was working
at the Documentary Studio.

He was the target
of ideological criticism,

and he suffered real persecution.

Vertov wasn't only criticised,

but persecuted, too.

And, I repeat,
was working in another studio.

Soviet directors

and people
with administrative positions

had to be present in person.

Living in different places,
they didn't come into contact.

Then, in 1937,

when they moved
into the same building,

Medvedkin was the director
of two banned films.

Happiness was boycotted by the press
rather than actually banned,

but The Miracle Workerwas banned.

He was persecuted by Shumiatsky

for having dared defend,
at a Party meeting,

Eisenstein's banned film,
Bezhin Meadow.

As for Vertov at that time,

almost all his projects
were denied production

and his films
hardly ever got screened.

So he tried to compromise

as stifle his theoretical conception
of Soviet reality.

He even tried to follow
Stalin's personality cult,

and he made...

Lullaby,
an excellent film in itself,

but which, politically,
perfectly suited those in power.

The film came out in 1937.

And so,

the press ignored
these two filmmakers,

while other filmmakers
lost interest in them.

They had become

nothing more
than simple Soviet employees,

even if it's sacrilegious
to say that.

They went to work,

but, as Aleksandr Ivanovich
used to say,

it was like punching a pillow:
there was no reaction.

They kept on trying,
throwing punch after punch,

but it was into a soft pillow
and there was never any reaction.

Silence from the press.

Their colleagues
probably talked to them,

but only about domestic problems.

When they became neighbours in 1937,

they couldn't meet in the daytime,
because they were at work.

And getting together in the evening
to discuss artistic questions...

was pointless
and, above all else, dangerous.

That's why...

I think,

there was never
any exchange between them.

It was impossible and they did
their utmost to avoid it.

Then life separated them once again.

During the war, Medvedkin was
in charge of a group at the front.

Before that
he was working in Azerbaijan.

Vertov was editing the news
at the Documentary Studio,

and his work as a director

was of no interest, either
to the press or his colleagues.

After the war,
Medvedkin went to Sverdlovsk,

and made Liberated Earth,

then worked in Kazakhstan.

Vertov died in 1954.

And it was at exactly the same time

that Medvedkin
joined the Documentary Studio.

Ironically, the place where
they could have worked together

was empty.

Vertov was dead.