Love in the age of communism : Soviet romantic comedy in the 1970s

• Main Author: Skott, Julia
• Format: Others
• Language: English
• Published: Stockholms universitet, Filmvetenskapliga institutionen 2006
• Subjects: Romantic comedy; romance; chronotope; Soviet; 1970s; genre; screwball; remarriage
• Online Access: http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:su:diva-1117

The author discusses three Soviet comedies from the 1970s: Moskva slezam ne verit (Moscow Does Not Believe in Tears, Vladimir Menshov, 1979), Osenniy marafon (Autumn Marathon, Georgi Daneliya, 1979), and Ironiya Sudby, ili S lyogkim parom (Irony of Fate, Eldar Ryazanov, 1975), and how they relate to both conventions of romance and conventions of the mainstream traditions of the romantic comedy genre. The text explores the evolution of the genre and accompanying theoretic writings, and relates them to the Soviet films, focusing largely on the conventions that can be grouped under an idea of the romantic chronotope. The discussion includes the conventions of chance and fate, of the wrong partner, the happy ending, the temporary and carnevalesque nature of romance, multiple levels of discourse, and some aspects of gender, class and power. In addition, some attention is paid to the ways in which the films connect to specific genre cycles, such as screwball comedy and comedy of remarriage, and to the implications that a communist system may have on the possibilities of love and romance. The author argues that Soviet and Hollywood films share many conventions of romance, but for differing reasons.