UID:
kobvindex_ZLB15244510
Format:
1 DVD-Video (85 Min.) : s/w
,
NTSC
,
DVD-R
ISBN:
1585874418
Content:
This rare, newly restored feature was originally advertised as "the first Yiddish talkie from Soviet Russia." The plot centers on Nathan Becker, a Jewish bricklayer who returns to Russia after twenty-eight years in America. After reuniting with his father (played with comic eccentricity by Solomon Mikhoels) Nathan leaves the shtetl to work in the new industrial center of Magnitogorsk. There, he soon finds that the work habits he acquired in America conflict with the Soviet system. While the film's resolution emphasizes the triumph of socialist productivity, the screenplay by Yiddish author Peretz Markish reflects the warmth and humor of the Jewish spirit. "The only Yiddish talkie ever made in the Soviet Union, The Return of Nathan Becker tells the story of a Russian-Jewish bricklayer who returns home from Depression-era America to a bustling new Soviet Union where Jews are abandoning decrepit shtetls--and their old ways--to build industrial powerhouses and a multiculti nation. Though it contains playful scenes, the rarely seen (and newly resubtitled) 1932 film is mostly on message: The Soviet Union is more dynamic, motivated, and accepting than the United States (Becker even brings an African-American friend with him to the new worker's paradise). The movie actually was made during a period in which Soviet anti-Semitism was receding, but of course that didn't last: Both scripter Peretz Markish and star Solomon Mikhoels were subsequently victims of Stalinist purges." Washington City Paper (NCJF)
Note:
Ländercode: 0
,
Orig.: UdSSR, 1932
,
schlechte Bild- und Tonqualität
,
Jidd., mit engl. Untertiteln
Language:
Yiddish
Author information:
Brusilovskij, Evgenij Grigor'evič
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