100 Days Before The Command Details

Completed in 1990 but withheld for four years, Uzbek-born Hussein Erkenov's featurette is as compelling as it is complex. Shot secretly during the last days of Communism, this expressionist, elliptical and quietly subversive study of authority and obedience follows a unit of raw Red Army unit recruits as they are gradually dehumanised by the rigidity of their routine. Adhering to the prescribed socialist-realist style, yet also evoking the work of such Soviet masters as Paradjanov (The Colour of Pomegranates) and Tarkovsky (Solaris, Stalker), this is a political, as well as a pacifist tract, which is given poetic power by cinematographer Vladimir Menshikov's astonishing use of light.

Shot in 1990, but not seen outside Russia until the director took a print to the 1994 Berlin Film Festival, this... read more on Time Out