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Flicker Alley, a specialty supplier of fine silent films and
classic cinema programming, in collaboration with The Blackhawk
Films Collection and Turner Classic Movies, proudly present the
American video premiere of epic Soviet serial adventure, Miss
Mend.
Produced in the Soviet Union in 1926, but inspired by American
movie cliffhangers of the day, this three-part, 4 ½ hour film
was directed by Fedor Ozep and Boris Barnet (who is also
featured in the cast).
Based on the 1923 pulp novel “Mess Mend”, both the film and its
source material share an interestingly “Westernized” pedigree;
though the novel claims to have been authored and published by
an American scribe “Jim Dollar,” the fictional persona is
actually a nom-de-plume for a Russian woman, Marietta Shaginian,
whose biography for Dollar explains that he was a laborer who
fell by sheer chance into tremendous fortune and publishes his
fiction at his own expense.
Regarded by the official Soviet press of the time as a prime
example of shameless "Western-style" entertainment, Miss Mend
was nevertheless hugely popular, becoming one of the most
successful Soviet films of the decade. Though you’ll find no
tractors, capitalist oppression, or revolution, the film does
manage a few jokes at the American characters’ ’ expense.
Co-director Boris Barnet, actor, ex-boxer, and a graduate of the
Kuleshov School, directed other notable silent films including
The Girl With the Hatbox and The House on Trubnaya Square; his
career extended to the mid-1960s with his most notable sound
film being Outskirts (1933). Fedor Ozep, also a screenwriter,
emigrated from the Soviet Union. In Germany, he directed a
wonderful version of Tolstoy's The Living Corpse and The Murder
of Dmitri Karamazov, making later films in France, and finishing
his long career as a Hollywood director.
Mastered in high definition from superb 35mm elements, with a
'dream cast' of 1920s Soviet film stars, Miss Mend pits a
cadre of proletarian sleuths against a villainous gang of
selfish capitalists, each side boasting its own collection of
zany sidekicks, everything from a streetwise urchin to a
Typhoid dog. The film also features beautiful location
photography, impressive stunt scenes, horse, car and boat
chases, and stylized sets inspired by Fritz Lang's German
thrillers.
MISS MEND is accompanied by a newly-recorded
large-orchestra score by Robert Israel. Soviet culture
specialists Ana Oleniva and Maxim Pozdorovkin wrote the new
English intertitles as well as a booklet essay, "Miss Mend and
Soviet Americanism" and a new 25-minute documentary, Miss Mend:
A Whirlwind Vision of Imagined America. Creating the Music of
Miss Mend is a behind-the-scenes look at Robert Israel's
recording sessions in the Czech Republic. This edition was
produced by David Shepard and Jeffery Masino, with digital
restoration and editing carried out by Eric Lange of Lobster
Films, Paris.
Turner Classic Movies will air
MISS MEND on Sunday, December 6th at Midnight ET.
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