About the film
Civil War, Central Asia. A Red Army unit crosses the desert. Its best shot is Maryutka, a fisherman's daughter who has killed forty White officers. The forty-first is supposed to be Govorukha-Otrok, a captured aristocratic lieutenant.
Sent across the Aral Sea with the prisoner, Maryutka is shipwrecked with him on a deserted island. Alone together, the fierce Red soldier and the educated White officer fall in love.
Chukhrai's first feature, shot in glowing colour by Sergei Urusevsky, was a sensation, a love story that put feelings above politics.
Did you know?
- It won a special prize at the 1957 Cannes festival.
- Cinematographer Sergei Urusevsky shot The Cranes Are Flying the following year.
- It was Grigori Chukhrai's debut feature.
