This robust survival adventure follows a team of Soviet geologists stranded in the wilderness of Siberia after a forest fire severs their communication link with civilization. The opening dedication to Socialist heroes everywhere and the noble sacrifices made by each character carry the story dangerously close to propaganda, but the intensity of their ordeal (through smoke and fire, over snow and ice, across mountains and tundra) thankfully overwhelms the political simplicity of the script. Unfortunately, it also overwhelms the initial hints of tension between each of the four characters (three male, one female) after the struggle to survive becomes paramount. The sense of isolation and exposure is numbing; the film was directed with a strong sense of visual drama (including more than one knockout montage), showing everything an audience would ever want to know about being lost in Siberia.

This relatively unknown 1959 movie from Soviet director Mikhail Kalatozov is a great adventure film. A guide and three geologists go to the virgin forests of Central Siberia in order to find diamonds. The geologists include Sabinin, the older leader, the young, nerdy Andrei and the pretty Tania, who is Andrei's fiancé. Soon, the guide will start having strong feelings toward Tania (the movie seems to imply you should never include a beautiful woman in an otherwise all-male expedition). Diamonds will be eventually found, but before they can return to civilization, the team will be engulfed by a vast forest fire, and they will die one by one. This film may be nothing more than a paean to muscular Soviet man (and woman), but it is very well done. The black and white photography is astonishing; there is a particular scene of the young couple running through the forest at high speed that is extremely beautiful; at times, the scenes are so realistic one wonders how they did this (did they actually put the actors next to a real forest fire?)

Saw this at Tribeca Film Festival in Spring 2007, and was absolutely floored. I walked out of the theater afterword amazed at what I'd seen and thrilled that such an amazing film existed and had been maintained by a tiny number of appreciators in such excellent quality for so long.The story is not the strong point of the movie. Rather, as with Terence Malick films, the story is just a starting point for the film, which is another beast entirely. What shines and carries the film from scene to scene is the cinematography. I didn't know if this was happened elsewhere at the time, but I didn't expect to see hand-held camera work in a 1959 Russian film, let alone the kind of early spinning, impossibly-filmed shot that appears early in the film. Later, there is a sequence that makes me long to know how they created the opportunity to film in such conditions.If you've read this far, you must track down this movie. My understanding is that Francis Coppola has a California archive maintain the only copy in the Americas, and that it's usually shown just one a year.

Welcome to Siberia, circa 1959 (in perfectly restored, glorious Black and White).Although this story revolves around four 'pioneers' dropped into a vast wilderness to search for a rumored vein of diamonds (aka 'the Diamond Pipe'), the real star of the movie is cinematographer Sergei Urusevsky ("Soy Cuba," "The Cranes Are Flying").Urusevsky is master of composition, dolly shots, and hand-held photography (when necessary). The way he frames his close-ups of the actors practically allows the audience to see into their souls.Of course, it helps that he's shooting a top-notch Russian cast, including actress Tatyana Samojlova ("The Cranes Are Flying") whose character 'Tanya' is desperate to survive the troubling events that befall the group. Tanya is also the lone female and commands the attentions of two men in the rock-sampling group (though one is unrequited).In addition, the visual elements are underscored aurally by composer Nikolai Kryukov's ("The Forty-first") evocative score, although he does amp up the music a bit too much in a couple of scenes. Not unusual for the time period, so set your appreciation meter back to the 50's and you won't be as bothered as I was.The title of the film refers to not one but two letters that figure into the plot. One is a long, personal letter that is referred to in voice-over from time to time throughout the film, while the other is a love letter thought to be hidden away until it accidentally comes to light.The plot is very straightforward so I won't spoil any surprises by detailing it here, suffice to say that the main attractions of this film are the artistic cinematography, the strong cast, and the director's choice to foreshadow plot elements by overlaying fiery images over his hardcharging trekkers.If you've never seen any films by director Mikhail Kalatozov ("The Red Tent," "Soy Cuba," "The Cranes Are Flying"), then this one is probably as accessible as any and with a new restoration to boot, practically a MUST-SEE.The ending alone is worth the price of admission, so check it out festival goers.