The epic journey of "First on the Moon"

Russian director Alexei Fedorchenko has taken a stylish look at Soviet idealism and ambition on "Perviyje na lune" (First on the Moon). The script, from the team of Alexander Gonorovsky and Ramil Yamaleyev, is the tale of an early attempt by the Soviets to be the first to reach the moon in the late thirties. It uses archive footage to bolster the period feel, fuelling the feeling that it is actually a documentary. To add to the confusion, it picked up a documentary award at Venice this year.

Yet the film's story itself is an epic journey. The original script had to go through eight years of financial crises, disintegrating public institutions and loan sharks to find its way to the screen. For the story behind the story, check the Moscow Times. For a review, check European Films.net.

Russian cinema about to explode

Russia has always had a unique and powerful cinema, starting with one of the early masters, Eisenstein. Since the fall of the Iron Curtain, the country went through a long curve of importing largely American TV and movies. But last year, Russia produced some 120 features - half the number in France, for example, but still a significant number. Consistent investment over the past 10 years has led to the creation of new studios and facilities. Unlike the rest of Europe, Russian cinema has started to focus very quickly on popular cinema. The most recent example is "Night Watch", which has broken all previous box office records and is Russia's candidate for a Best Foreign Language Oscar. The rights have been bought by Fox Searchlight, with talks of an English-language version.

Speaking to Screen International, producer Konstantin Ernst is upbeat about the future: "I see the Russian market developing along the lines of the Japanese market, rather than the European model. Like Japan, 30-40% of the market will be locally-produced. The Russian economy is growing and it is going to continue to grow. Russian audiences want to see big budget Russian films and this is the kind of film we are going to see produced. For five years Russian audiences wanted to see American TV programmes but after seven years we began to produce our own. Now we are going to see the same with films."

Cottbus awards East-European movies

Germany's FilmFestival Cottbus, dedicated to East-European movies, just wrapped. Main prize for the Best Film in the Feature Film Competition went to "Schizo (Schiza)" by Gulshad (Guka) Omarowa, a Russian-Kazakh-French-German co-production. Sulev Keedus was awarded the Special Prize for Best Direction for the Estonian-Finnish co-production "Somnabul". The Special Prize for an outstanding artistic individual achievement went to the Croatian film "A Wonderful Night in Split (Ta Divna Splitska Noc)" by Arsen Anton Ostojic. A Special Mention was given to the Polish film "The Wedding (Wesele) by Wojtek Smarzowski. See FilmFestival Cottbus for full details in German and English.