Maria Romanovskaya

To justify the fantastic adventures of the blacksmith Vakula, the authors of the film “simplify” Gogol’s plot: Vakula, having drunk too much at Patsiuk’s place, falls asleep. And he sees this dream where the devil takes him to the palace of Catherine II in Saint-Petersburg; and there Vakula takes off the little shoes of the Russian empress to give them to his fiancée Oksana. And, really, drunk Vakula takes off the shoes while sleeping… but from Patsiuk. Later, when Vakula unwraps the package with the “royal slippers” in front of Oksana, he finds only Patsiuk’s dirty shoes there.

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Germany, 1923. Workers, called to the struggle by the communist Niels Unger, seize the arsenal and turn every building into a fortress. The social democrat Buk does not fulfill Unger's order to blow up the bridge over the Elbe, so the Reichswehr troops enter the city. A bloody massacre begins. Nils Unger is arrested. Buk, who is associated with the punitive leader Meins, betrays the rebels during interrogations. A trial is scheduled for the rebels. To avoid political publicity during the trial, Nils Unger is declared insane, but manages to escape from the prison hospital. Once again, his call resounds through the streets of Hamburg: "Save your guns!"

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In the first years of NEP, one of the committees Relief for Starving evacuates an orphan girl Mariika from a starving village into a city. Mariika runs away on the way over.

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