The Ascent

It is the New Year's Eve and the employees of an Economics Institute are ready with their annual New Year's entertainment program. It includes a lot of dancing and singing, jazz band performance and even magic tricks. Suddenly, an announcement is made that a new director has been elected and that he is arriving shortly. Comrade Ogurtsov arrives in time to review and disapprove of the scheduled entertainment. To him, holiday fun has a different meaning. He imagines speakers reading annual reports to show the Institute's progress over the year, and, perhaps, a bit of serious music, something from the Classics, played by the Veterans' Orchestra. Obviously, no one wants to change the program a few hours before the show, much less to replace it with something so boring! Now everyone has to team up in order to prevent Ogurtsov from getting to the stage. As some of them trap Ogurtsov one way or another, others perform their scheduled pieces and celebrate New Year's Eve.

Anya, finding herself in unfamiliar Kyiv, meets casual acquaintances who help her adapt to the new city. One of them, engineer Sasha, accompanies her to the train station and later comes to her city. He persuades Anya to enroll in a Kyiv institute, which she agrees to do.

Former fighter pilot turned provincial schoolmistress Nadezhda Petrovna struggles to adapt to peacetime, having internalised military ideals of service and obedience.

As an adviser to the emperor Nicholas II, mystic Grigori Rasputin holds great influence over the empire. However, many in St Petersburg begin to regard Rasputin, with his strange practices and mesmerizing qualities, as a liability and plot his assassination. When Rasputin, known to many as the 'Mad Monk', leads Nicholas to embrace an ill-conceived military strategy, a group of determined conspirators set down a plan to eliminate him.

Four former soldiers reunite 25 years after the war. Last time they saw each other on the Byelorussian railway station in the summer of 1945. Now they've come together to mourn the death of a friend.

Matyora is a small village on a beautiful island with the same name. The existence of the village is threatened with flooding by the construction of a dam. This is the story of the inhabitants of Matyora and their farewell to their homeland.

Pyotr, a once-promising neurosurgeon who left his groundbreaking research and career abroad, returns home years later in search of fulfillment. Encountering old friends, strained relationships, and the realities of his choices, Pyotr grapples with regret, identity, and the value of his work.

Combining staged scenes, newsreel footage, and documentary episodes, the history of the development of sports is presented, showing the stadiums of Moscow, Philadelphia, Stockholm and Mexico City in the past and future.

Two young directors adapted the short stories of two Russian authors whose works had been banned for decades, and so their film ended up in the censor’s vault as well – for twenty years. Both tales look back to the post-revolutionary era: 'Angel' (Olesha) speaks tragically of the brutality and destruction of the time, and 'The Homeland of Electricity' (Platonov) captures its haunting grotesquery.

New Year's Eve 1969: A variety of Russian folklore characters gather in the hut of Baga Yaga to await the arrival of the New Year, amid much foolery, snippets of popular artists of the day, satirical views of the west via a magical kaleidoscope, and other hijinks.

A Soviet dam project means that many old Ukrainian villages will end up under water. There are conflicts between the dam engineers and villagers who don't want to move.

An idealistic high school graduate goes to work on a state farm on the Kyrgyz steppe, only to clash with its authoritarian leader.

The second graduation work from Larisa Shepitko.

1914, Imperial Russia. A group of Ukrainian peasants searching for a better life in the Taurida steppe end up working at the landholding of the aristocratic Falz-Fein family. Friends Vustya and Hanna are courted by a revolutionary and the landowner's son, both rising their hopes and dreams.

Two lovers cannot be together—the girl’s authoritarian father refuses to approve the marriage. When the young man kills him, a third figure—the couple’s childhood best friend—rushes to take revenge. He is faced with a difficult choice.