The Devil's Wheel

The Devil's Wheel

1926 · 40 min · ★ 5.7 · Action, Crime

Typically of the heady days of early Soviet cinema, this is constructed according to the fast, sharp editing principles advocated by Eisenstein, complete with symbolic inserts; but in terms of subject matter, it's much less explicitly political than most movies emerging from Russia in the '20s. Chronicling a young sailor's descent into a murky, treacherous underworld of pimps and thieves, after having encountered a Louise Brooks lookalike at a fairground and missed his departing boat, it's a lively moral fable that delights in vivid visual effects and quirky characterisations. If the plot occasionally reveals gaping holes, and the tacked-on ending urging the clearance of the Leningrad slums seems to be rather gratuitous, there's enough going on to keep one attentive and amused.

Directed by Grigori Kozintsev · Written by Adrian Piotrovskiy

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Cast

Pyotr Sobolevsky Vanya Shorin, Red fleet sailor
Lyudmila Semyonova Valya
Sergei Gerasimov The Question Man
Emil Gal Koko, vaudeville performer
Antonio Tserep Tavern Owner
Nikolay Gorodnichev House manager
V. Lande Cafe dancer
Sergei Martinson Orchestra conductor
Yevgeniy Kumeyko Hooligan
I. Berezin Hooligan
Yanina Zheymo Hooligan girl
Tatyana Ventsel

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