Kira Muratova

Kira Heorhiyivna Muratova (Ukrainian: Кіра Георгіївна Мура́това; née Korotkova, 5 November 1934 – 6 June 2018[1][2]) was a Soviet and Ukrainian award-winning film director, screenwriter and actress, known for her unusual directorial style. Her films underwent a great deal of censorship in the Soviet Union.

This name uses Eastern Slavic naming customs; the patronymic is Georgiyivna and the family name is Korotkova/Muratova.
Kira Muratova

People's Artist of Ukraine
Кіра Георгіївна Муратова
Kira Muratova in 2006
Born(1934-11-05)5 November 1934
Soroca, Kingdom of Romania (now Moldova)
Died6 June 2018(2018-06-06) (aged 83)
Odessa, Ukraine
Other namesKira Georgiyivna Korotkova
OccupationFilm director
Screenwriter
Years active1961–2018

Muratova spent most of her artistic career in Odessa, creating her films with local studios, mostly casting local actors.

Biography

Early life and career

Kira Korotkova was born in 1934 in Soroca, Romania (present-day Moldova) to a Russian father[3] and a Romanian mother[4][5]. Her parents were both active communists and members of the Communist Party. Her father, Yuri Korotkov, participated in the anti-fascist guerilla movement in World War II, was arrested by Romanian forces and shot after interrogation. After the war, Kira lived in Bucharest with her mother, a gynaecologist, who then pursued a government career in Socialist Romania.

In 1959, Kira graduated from the Gerasimov Institute of Cinematography in Moscow, specializing in directing. Upon graduation Korotkova received a director position with the Odessa Film Studio in Odessa, a port city at the Black Sea near to her native Bessarabia. She directed her first professional film in 1961 and worked with the studio until a professional conflict made her to move to Leningrad in 1978. There she made one film with Lenfilm Studio, but returned to Odessa afterwards. Muratova's films came under constant criticism of the Soviet officials due to her idiosyncratic film language that did not comply with the norms of socialist realism. Film scholar Isa Willinger has compared Muratova's cinematographic form to the Soviet Avant-garde, especially to Eisenstein's montage of attractions.[6] Several times Muratova was banned from working as a director for a number of years each time.

Kira married her fellow Odessa studio director Oleksandr Muratov in the early 1960s and co-created several films with him. The couple had a daughter, Marianna, but soon divorced and Muratov moved to Kiev where he started work with Dovzhenko Film Studios. Kira Muratova kept her ex-husband's surname despite her later marriage to Leningrad painter and production designer Evgeny Golubenko.

Post-Soviet period

In the 1990s, an extremely productive period began for Muratova, during which she shot a feature film every two or three years, often working with the same actors and crew. Two actresses Muratova has repeatedly cast are Renata Litvinova and Natalya Buzko. Muratova's films were usually productions of Ukraine or co-productions between Ukraine and Russia, always in the Russian language, although Muratova could speak Ukrainian and did not object to the Ukrainianization of Ukrainian cinema[7]). Muratova supported the Euromaidan protesters and the following 2014 Ukrainian revolution.[8]

Muratova's films were premiered at International Film Festivals in Berlin, Cannes, Moscow, Rome, Venice and others. Next to Aleksandr Sokurov, She was considered the most idiosyncratic contemporary Russian-language film director. Her works can be seen as postmodern, employing eclecticism, parody, discontinuous editing, disrupted narration and intense visual and sound stimuli.[6]

Recognition and awards

It was only during Perestroyka that Muratova received wide public recognition and first awards. In 1988, the International Women's Film Festival Créteil (France) showed a first retrospective of her works. Her film Among Grey Stones was screened in the Un Certain Regard section at the 1988 Cannes Film Festival.[9] In 1990, her film Asthenic Syndrome won the Jury Grand Prix at the Berlinale.[10] In 1994, she was awarded the Leopard of Honour for her life oeuvre at The Locarno International Film Festival (Switzerland) and in 2000, she was given the Andrzej Wajda Freedom Award.[6] In 1997, her film Three Stories was entered into the 47th Berlin International Film Festival.[11] Her 2002 film Chekhov's Motifs was entered into the 24th Moscow International Film Festival.[12] Her film The Tuner was shown at the Venice Film Festival in 2004. Her films received the Russian "Nika" prize in 1991, 1995, 2005, 2007, 2009 and 2013. In 2005, a retrospective was shown at the Lincoln Center in New York City. In 2013, a full retrospective of her films was shown at the International Film Festival Rotterdam.[13]

Muratova in 2010 conducting her personal master class at the Odessa International Film Festival.

Filmography
Year Title (Original) Title (English) Director Writer Actress Notes
1961 У Крутого Яра By the Steep Ravine Yes Yes With Aleksandr Muratov
1964 Наш честный хлеб Our Honest Bread Yes as Agapa With Aleksandr Muratov
1967 Короткие встречи Brief Encounters Yes Yes as Valentina Ivanovna
1971 Долгие проводы The Long Farewell Yes
1972 Россия Russia Documentary; with Theodore Holcomb
1978 Познавая белый свет Getting to Know the Big, Wide World Yes Yes
1983 Среди серых камней Among Grey Stones Yes Renounced by Muratova after major political censorship (credited to "Ivan Sidorov" )
1987 Перемена участи Change of Fate Yes Yes
1989 Астенический синдром The Asthenic Syndrome Yes Yes
1992 Чувствительный милиционер The Sentimental Policeman Yes Yes
1994 Увлеченья Passions Yes
1997 Три истории Three Stories Yes
1999 Письмо в Америку Letter to America Yes Short
2001 Второстепенные люди Minor People Yes Yes
2002 Чеховские мотивы Chekhov's Motifs Yes Yes
2004 Настройщик The Tuner Yes Yes
2005 Справка Certification Yes Short
2006 Кукла Dummy Yes Short
2007 Два в одном Two in One Yes
2009 Мелодия для шарманки Melody for a Street-organ Yes Yes
2012 Вечное возвращение. Кастинг Eternal Redemption: The Casting Yes Yes

Books

Upon an initiative of the arts patron Yuri Komelkov, Atlant UMC has published an album on Kira Muratova's work. In this album, the author of the photos, Konstantin Donin, confined himself to the film set frames, acting as a screen reporter of the film Two-in-one.[14]

In 2005, a study on the life and work of Muratova was published by I.B. Tauris in the KINOfiles Filmmakers' Companion series.[15]

See also

References
  1. Умерла Кира Муратова
  2. Kira Muratova, Renowned Ukrainian Director, Dies at 83
  3. Jonathan Rosenbaum
  4. Illegal Communist Movement in Prewar Romania: Natalia Reznic Korotkova (1906–1981).
  5. Viața și moartea unui comunist basarabean Iuri Korotkov, tatăl Kirei Muratova
  6. "Willinger, Isa (2013): "Circus Tricks and Eisenstein's 'Montage of Attractions': Traces of the Russian Film-Avant-garde in Muratova's Oeuvre"". Retrieved 2015-01-09.
  7. Більше читайте тут: https://tsn.ua/glamur/rezhiser-kira-muratova-ya-na-boci-cogo-narodu-ya-z-maydanom-341183.html
  8. Більше читайте тут: https://tsn.ua/glamur/rezhiser-kira-muratova-ya-na-boci-cogo-narodu-ya-z-maydanom-341183.html
  9. "Festival de Cannes: Among Grey Stones". festival-cannes.com. Retrieved 2009-07-31.
  10. "Berlinale: 1990 Prize Winners". berlinale.de. Retrieved 2011-03-16.
  11. "Berlinale: 1997 Programme". berlinale.de. Retrieved 2012-01-14.
  12. "24th Moscow International Film Festival (2002)". MIFF. Archived from the original on 2013-03-28. Retrieved 2013-03-31.
  13. Tempelman, Olaf (January 2013). "Voor alles en iedereen ongrijpbaar". De Volkskrant (in Dutch) (International Film Festival Rotterdam). p. 12.
  14. #Literature.
  15. Bloomsbury.com. "Kira Muratova". Bloomsbury Publishing. Retrieved 2020-04-08.

Literature
  • Donin [Донин, К. А.]. Кадр за кадром: Кира Муратова. Хроника одного фильма. К.: ООО «Атлант-ЮЭмСи», 2007. 119 с. ISBN 978-966-8968-11-2. (in Russian)
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