The Cinematheque hosts Ukrainian Poetic Cinema: Rebuilding National Identity series, October 23 to 29
Films on offer include Yurii Illienko’s The Eve of Ivan Kupalo and Borys Ivchenko’s The Lost Letter
The Eve of Ivan Kupalo
The Cinematheque is launching a new series, Ukrainian Poetic Cinema: Rebuilding National Identity, from October 23 to 29. This series offers the chance to see two of the brightest examples of Ukrainian poetic cinema, in signature films by Yurii Illienko and Borys Ivchenko.
In the 1960s, producers at Dovzhenko Film Studio wanted to adapt every story in Evenings Near the Village of Dikanka, an 1832 collection by Mykola Hohol (better known as Nikolai Gogol). Although considered a great avatar of Russian literature, Hohol was in fact born and raised in Ukraine, where these stories are set. Only two of the project’s films were ever completed: Illienko’s dreamlike forbidden love story The Eve of Ivan Kupalo in 1968 and Ivchenko’s comedic adventure-road movie The Lost Letter in 1972.
Both films draw deeply from Ukrainian folk traditions and from the country’s painful history.
For Ukrainian Poetic Cinema tickets and more information, visit The Cinematheque.
Post sponsored by The Cinematheque.
The Lost Letter
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