Nikolay Kozlovsky

This 1928 film features stylized cinematography and actors from the Moscow Art Theater in a fiction story based on the life of Jewish Labor Bund member Hirsch Lekert who attempted to assassinate the Vilna governor in 1902 to avenge the flogging of workers who participated in a May Day rally.

A comedy starring Nina Shaternikova, The Skotinins is loosely based on the 18th century play The Minor by Denis Fonvizin. In it, the upper class is shown as both depraved and stupid, engaging a variety of absurd, over-the-top follies.

The Soviet embassy in England sends two couriers with diplomatic mail to Leningrad. The inspector of security police, White, and a group of policemen attack the Soviet diplomatic couriers at night. The documents get to an English trackman, who gives them to his son, a sailor in Portsmouth.

The film mocks the moribund world of pan-Poland. The border established by the Treaty of Riga between pan-Poland and Soviet Belorussia passed through the estate of Polish Count Wadecki. The best part of the estate with the palace ended up on Soviet territory. From that moment on, the count lost peace and sleep. New owners - a noisy, cheerful pioneer squad - took up residence in the former manor house. The count's servants, shepherd boy Vasya and servant girl Yadya, watch the life of their neighbours with keen interest. Having accidentally crossed the border in search of a stray cow, Vasya happily stays in Soviet Belarus. He is followed by Yadia. Eventually the Count and his "lordly" guests cannot bear the sight of the noisy youth festivities on the Soviet side and flee. Yadia and Vasil participate in the Soviet youth party.

The young serf Eremey Mizgir is surrendered as a soldier by his mistress for his mischievous tricks. Mizgir ends up in St. Petersburg in the guards regiment. Resourceful, quick-witted, cheerful, he easily copes with his official duties and, although he often gets punished by the sergeant-major for his pranks, he never loses heart. But then sad news came from the village: the old people’s cow had died, and Eremey’s bride Dunya was being relentlessly pursued by the clerk. The soldier felt sad. Standing on guard at the rich, diamond-studded icon of the Kazan Mother of God and thinking about how to help the elderly and the bride, Mizgir decides to take a desperate step. He breaks the glass of the icon and picks out a large gemstone from the aureole of the Mother of God. When the loss is discovered, Mizgir, without blinking an eye, announces that the Mother of God herself gave him the stone.