Stalinist Cinema and the Production of History: Museum of the Revolution by Evgeny Dobrenko, Sarah Young

MLR, 104.3, 2009 931 shaped the self at a timewhen self-realization was amale prerogative. And it makes you want to reread Carry van Br?ggen, and that is surely a good thing. University of Sheffield Henriette Louwerse Stalinist Cinema and the Production ofHistory: Museum of the Revolution. By Evgeny Dobrenko. Trans, by Sarah Young. Edinburgh: Edinburgh Univer sityPress. 2008. 263 pp. ?60. ISBN 978-0-7486-3445-3. In a thriving context of research intoRussian and Soviet film, Evgeny Dobrenko's book adds to the long-neglected Stalin era, which is now attracting the scholarly attention itdeserves. In the introduction Dobrenko sets out the task of his book which is not to provide a history of Soviet cinema in the Stalin era: rather, the author seeks to examine how the institution of cinema played a central role in the production ofhistory. When establishing hismethodological foundations, Dobrenko argues that, through the construction of the past, history isgiven a therapeutic role of removing social trauma from real experience, but notes that 'the cost of this therapeutic procedure is alienation of thepast' (pp. 7-8). Drawing inspiration from theorists such as Jean Baudrillard, Dobrenko discusses the idea of themuseum as 'materialized history and themeans by which the past is destroyed and a new memory is constructed. He introduces cinema as a 'museum of the post-industrial era, and under Stalinism one of the key functions of this cinematic museum is the ressurrection of dead people and objects. Dobrenko argues that the Stalinist museum of cinema sought to 'historicize reality through a series of different genres. For example, when discussing histori cal biography films, he contends that the aim ofMikhail Romm's films Admiral Ushakov and The Ships Storm theBastions (both 1953) was the 'historicisation of the geopolitical realities of post-war Europe' (pp. 99-101). In other words, the political conflicts of the present are 'projected onto the past'. Thus inRomm's two films the portrayal of theRussian navy in the nineteenth century 'was a direct projection of the new greatness of the Soviet Union aftervictory over Germany' (p. 102), and confirmed Russia as the liberator of Europe. This historicizing strategymanifested itself in other areas, such as literary adaptations. Dobrenko points out that, in the mid to late 1930s, when regime legitimacy was the central goal, film adaptations, such as Vladmir Petrov's The Storm (1934), based on Alexander Ostrovskii's play, tended to project a negative image ofmisery onto the Russian past in order to justify the Revolution. However, aftervictory in theGreat Patriotic War, the need for legitimacy 'dropped away' and, suddenly, a confident film industrywas pro jecting Stalinist abundance and luxury, in such films asMore Sinned against than Sinning (1945), also based on Ostrovskii's play, onto a now 'glorious' Russian past. Thus Dobrenko shows how, through film adaptation, the classics were alienated and transformed into artefacts in Soviet cinema's narrative museum. Over the course of the firsttwo chapters this reader was struck by the abundance of ideas in thework. While this can, ifnot skilfullydealt with, undermine a central 932 Reviews thread or overall coherence, the key to this book's success is precisely theway in which the authormanages to combine and weave themany threads inhis argument into a satisfyingwhole. The idea of analysing cinema as amuseum is a creative and rewarding approach which helps us to understand that a regime thatwas in great need of legitimacywould need toharness the 'waxwork' figures of the past to confer meaning and positive logic on the Soviet present. Moreover, Dobrenko also explores theway inwhich many films attempted to provide entertainment through plots thatwere conspiratorial and politically para noid in nature. While the author's description of films such as The Great Citizen (1937-39) or Lenin in 1918 (1939) exaggerates their appeal to themass audience, he manages to identifyone centralmethod bywhich Soviet film-makers tried tomake the sometimes dull cinematic museum appealing. In sum, this is a rigorous and engrossing work that brings a profound understanding to the films of the Stalinist era and will initiate debates on major films that, to date, have been largely ignored in cinematic history. University of Toronto Jamie Miller ...

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