MOSCOW DOES NOT BELIEVE IN TEARS (MOSKVA SLEZAM NE VERIT)

USSR, 1979, 140 minutes, Colour.
Directed by Vladmir Menshov.

Moscow Does Not Believe In Tears won the Oscar for Best Foreign Film in 1981. While it portrays Russian life in the '50s and in '70s, it is very accessible to western audiences. In fact, the Russian writers and directors seem to have their eye on the Hollywood soap operas and to be giving their version of the trials and tribulations of three young working girls venturing out into the city and their lives twenty years later.

There is nothing particularly new in the film but it is made with some affection and with some irony. It is quite enjoyable in its way - and a different picture from popular images of Russian society both in the 1950s and in later decades.

1. A popular and entertaining film? For Russian audiences? international audiences? Its winning the Oscar?

2. The structure of the film: the first half in 1958, the atmosphere of the time, the post-Stalinist era, the young girls in the workers' dormitory, their work and Study, falling in love? The contrast with the late 1970s, greater 'affluence', greater `sophistication'? The next generation?

3. The colour photography, the echoes of American soap opera films of the period? The atmosphere of Russia? Musical score?

4. The portrait of Caterina - her working in the factory, her doing her study, her looking after her uncle's flat, the friendship with Ludmilla and Tonya? Their party? Posing as professors' daughters? Rudi and Caterina's attraction? Her affair with Rudi? Her becoming pregnant, not telling him? Her growing importance in the factory, representing the workers, the television programme (and Rudi in the crew)? His hearing of the pregnancy, his refusal to have anything to do with it? The birth of the baby? The room by themselves? The portrait of a young girl in the city? The transition to twenty years later? Katya as factory director? The encounter with Gosch? Her falling in love with him? The meeting of Rudi again? His demands? His following her home? Encounter with Cosch, his reaction against her? Her being upset? Her love for her daughter, their life together, Sascha getting Cosch to return? The happy ending?

5. Ludmila and Caterina to help with the party? Posing as professors' daughters? Gurin and his reputation, Ludmilla and her affair? The confession of the truth to Gurin? His proposal? Their marriage? Twenty years later and Gurin's alcoholism? Ludmilla divorced? The lack of basis for their marriage, its collapse?

6. Tonya and her work in the bakery? Ordinary young woman? Less in the foreground than the others? The irony of her marrying Nicolai? Their move to the country, their house? The house as a refuge for the others? The happy life? Her sons?

7. The next generation? Sascha and her being alone? The listening to pop records? Her being more poised than her mother? Her helping her mother with Gosch? The contrast with Tonya's three sons and their prospects, lifestyle? Bringing the girl home? The differences in standards between the '50s and the 1970s? (Echoes of changes throughout the world?)

8. The film's reliance on mood, vivacity of the characters, the expectations of their interrelationships? Sentiment?

9. The different translations of the title - for England 'Moscow Distrusts Tears'? For the United States and elsewhere, 'Moscow Does Not Believe in Tears'?