Leonid Filatov Movies

In this drama, a directing debut of the popular Russian actor Leonid Filatov, the actors at a Moscow repertory theater company react with ever-increasing activism to the news that their company is to be closed down by the government. One of the rep company's directors committed the cardinal sin of defecting during an international tour. At first, the members of the company simply lodge their protests with the bureaucrat who is responsible for the order of closure. When this doesn't move him, they resort to attempts to seduce him and then blackmail him. Still, he will not relent. They finally try a hunger strike. This film is based on a true story. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

Shag is a beach flick set in 1963. The years have passed, but the old Where the Boys Are formula holds firm: Four attractive young lasses head for the surf and sand of Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, looking for guys. Phoebe Cates is about to be married, so her three pals seek out a final affair d'amour on her behalf before she is lost to the world forever. The cast is fascinating for its family ties: Bridget Fonda is the daughter of Peter Fonda, Page Hannah the sister of Darryl Hannah, and Tyrone Power III is the son of you-know-who. Filmed in 1988, Shag was released that year in Europe, then offered to American audiences one year later. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This fact-filled biography of the Russian diplomat Georgi Chicherin was released in 1986 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of his death. Chicherin, a Russian aristocrat, was jailed in London not long after the 1917 Revolution. Lenin gets him released and puts him in charge of foreign relations for the new USSR. Chicherin soon finds himself in Italy, hobnobbing with the likes of Lloyd George and the King of Italy (quite a contrast to his stay in prison). Involved in the first signing of a peace accord with Germany, Chicherin has to follow orders even if he personally does not agree with the accord. But at the same time, he put all his efforts into obtaining the accord, and in so doing breaks the diplomatic blockade of his now Communist homeland. Chicherin's career unfolds against a tumultuous historical backdrop. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

In a compelling drama that moves rapidly along, a rich German baron leaves his country in 1944 to live in Latin America -- where he discovers the truth about Nazi atrocities and fanaticism and where he also falls in love with Olga (Tatyana Drubich) an impoverished local woman. She reciprocates his feelings and the two begin an affair, a relationship that antagonizes the already nasty American consul who would like to arrest the baron -- not so much because he has a German passport, but because the consul is also interested in Olga. In order to save the man she loves, Olga goes to the consulate and gives in to the consul's sexual demands. Meanwhile, a little orphan who is devoted to Olga (and ostensibly, to the baron as well) is taunted by his friends who shout slurs on Olga's character -- they know what she has done at the consulate. In agony over their sarcasm, the little boy steals a gun from the baron with the full intent of taking justice into his own hands. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Katya (Tanya Aksyuta) and Roman (Nikita Mikhailovsky) are two teenagers who fall in love in spite of the opposition of one of their parents. Katya's mother (Irina Miroshnichenko) and Roman's father (Albert Filozov) had known each other in a most friendly way many years earlier - and now they are going to be neighbors. Roman's mother (Lidiya Fedoseyeva-Shukshina) does not like the idea of a possible old flame suddenly being rekindled, and she does everything she can to keep Katya and Roman apart, in order to lessen any reason for contact between the two families. A schoolteacher enters into the picture, making the odds a little better for Katya and Roman who are determined to overcome his mother's opposition to their relationship. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide