The Most Important Art: Soviet and East European Film After 1945

by Mira Liehm, Antonin Liehm

Book by Liehm, Mira, Liehm, Antonin

Genres: Film

476 pages, Paperback

First published March 3, 1977

Reviews

[Anthony McGill · Rating 5 out of 5]

The nationalized film industries of Eastern Europe produced some of the most interesting and important films made anywhere in the post-World War II period. This book is an invaluable, detailed and comprehensive critical history of this period, surveying the films and filmmakers of the Communist bloc: the Soviet Union, Poland, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Bulgaria, Romania and Yugoslavia from 1945 to the mid 1970s.

The authors were film critics and journalists in their native Czechoslovakia before leaving in 1969 and provide an intimate insiders view of the Eastern European film movement of the era. One of the great virtues of this book is that it not only covers the high points - works which have become justly renowned throughout the world - but also many films which were important in their own countries but did not receive foreign notice. Even for those of us who grew up in film societies many of these worthwhile entries were rarely seen outside of the Eastern Bloc.

Part 1 provides an account of the various national film industries of Eastern Europe from their beginnings to 1945.
Part II (1945-1955) discusses the period of bureaucratic controls.
Part III describes the film developments that paralleled the popular revolts in Hungary, Poland, and the GDR after Stalin's death.
Part IV deals with the post-1962 period - the remarkable flowering of Czechoslovak cinema, and new developments in Poland, the Soviet Union and elsewhere.

With more than 300 black and white stills and a comprehensive index, this book is essential for anyone interested in this period of filmmaking. 467 pages.

"The most important art" .... V. Lenin.

Review based on University of California Press hardcover edition, 1977.

[lcjfrc · Rating 4 out of 5]

The title refers to Lenin's account of the medium of film as the most important and potent artistic output. The book works well as an introductory piece to the topic, but it is a useful guide for a more experienced ruminating too. Everything is touched upon very briefly, but it ends up helpful in general orientation. There is not much space for the elaboration of influences among the directors and national cinemas though. Some concepts are superficially presented, but at times exactly the opposite is true - there is a good deal of analysis that transcends much of what has been undertaken in the literature written in these cinemas' national languages.

Btw. some really good film categorizations in this book made really good subtitles, like "The Moralists", "You Have Not Changed at All!", etc.