BUMAZHNY SOLDAT (PAPER SOLDIER)

Russia, 2008, 118 minutes, Colour.
Directed by Alexey German Jr.

Paper Soldier is a rather grim Russian film. It is set in 1961 in the six weeks prior to Yuri Gagarin’s flight in space. However, rather than the Right Stuff, this is the very bleak stuff.

The cosmodrome where the training was held and the rocket sent was in central Kazakhstan. (And the portrayal here makes Borat’s pictures of Kazakhstan look like a holiday resort.) Kazakhstan is overcast, desolate, desert with a dromedary, at the end of the line it would seem, sometimes full of slush and mud. The sequences in Moscow, mainly interiors, seem little better.

However, the film focuses on a doctor who has nightmares prior to the flight. He is alienated from his wife whom he re-meets in Moscow and a young woman is attracted to him in Kazakhstan. The film shows the various cosmonauts, the trials, the accidents and the doctor trying to treat the burns and other injuries. However, during the six weeks, he collapses and dies. The film focuses on his rather cold doctor wife as well as the young woman who is attracted to him.

The style of the film is very much close-ups and extreme close-ups, especially of faces and talking heads. In fact, the film is very much a talking affair, full of existential angst and abstract reflections on the meaning of life. More attention is given to this aspect of the dialogue than development of any of the characters.

While this is of interest in terms of a criticism of the Stalinist era as well as the immediate post-Stalinist era as well as the ambitious dreams of the Soviet Union in the middle of the 20th century – for habitations on the moon, cities and factories, the further exploration and habitation of space … However, the typical Russian gloom takes over the film and makes it rather hard going for a non-Russian audience.

1.A film for Russians? Non- Russian audiences? Interest in the beginnings of the flights into space? The comparisons with The Right Stuff and the United States? The Russian training, launching of rockets, accidents? Achievement?

2.The Kazakhstan settings, the cosmodrome, the desolate and isolated countryside? The weather? Cold, overcast? The rain, the mud flats? The dromedary? The musical score? The contrast with Moscow, the interiors, the hospitals, the laboratories? An authentic feel?

3.The structure of the film: the six weeks before Yuri Gagarin’s launch? The cumulative effect of the weeks, the characters, the preparations?

4.The title? The reference to Daniel? As a doctor? Wanting to be an cosmonaut? His role in the preparations? His own personal life, the nightmares, his not being able to remember them, his sense of dread?

5.Daniel as a character, age, his marriage to his wife, the brittle relationship? The young woman in Kazakhstan? With his wife, their getting together, her career? His not being able to sustain the relationship? His work in Moscow, the consultations, treating the burns? His going back to Kazakhstan, his decline, his collapse, riding the bike? His death?

6.Daniel’s wife, as a doctor, career? Hard? With Daniel? The divorce? Her travelling to Kazakhstan to see him, finding him, his collapse? With Vera? Her bonding with Vera after his death?

7.The astronauts, the accidents, the training, their good spirits? The achievement? Gagarin and his flight?

8.The technical aspects, the initial accident, the burning? Daniel and his sense of smell of burning? The rockets and their being launched? The variety of scientists, the discussions?

9.Vera, from Kazakhstan, her devotion to Daniel, his return? With Vera?

10.1971, ten years of the space race? The American achievement? The limited Russian achievement? The wife still working for the space exploration? Vera and her greater sophistication, quoting Chekhov? Life in Russia in the 70s?

11.The criticism of the Stalinist era? Stalin’s massacres? The portrait of Stalin? The criticisms of the cruelty?

12.The contrast with the dreams, putting people on the moon, factories, life on Mars? The end of the century? The lack of fulfilment of the Russian dream?