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Love in the age of communism : Soviet romantic comedy in the 1970s

<p>The author discusses three Soviet comedies from the</p><p>1970s: Moskva slezam ne verit (Moscow Does Not Believe</p><p>in Tears, Vladimir Menshov, 1979), Osenniy marafon</p><p>(Autumn Marathon, Georgi Daneliya, 1979), and Ironiya</p><p>Sudby, ili S lyogkim parom (Irony of Fate, Eldar</p><p>Ryazanov, 1975), and how they relate to both</p><p>conventions of romance and conventions of the</p><p>mainstream traditions of the romantic comedy genre.</p><p>The text explores the evolution of the genre and</p><p>accompanying theoretic writings, and relates them to</p><p>the Soviet films, focusing largely on the conventions</p><p>that can be grouped under an idea of the romantic</p><p>chronotope. The discussion includes the conventions of</p><p>chance and fate, of the wrong partner, the happy</p><p>ending, the temporary and carnevalesque nature of</p><p>romance, multiple levels of discourse, and some</p><p>aspects of gender, class and power. In addition, some</p><p>attention is paid to the ways in which the films</p><p>connect to specific genre cycles, such as screwball</p><p>comedy and comedy of remarriage, and to the</p><p>implications that a communist system may have on the</p><p>possibilities of love and romance. The author argues</p><p>that Soviet and Hollywood films share many conventions</p><p>of romance, but for differing reasons.</p>

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA/oai:DiVA.org:su-1117
Date January 2006
CreatorsSkott, Julia
PublisherStockholm University, Department of Cinema Studies
Source SetsDiVA Archive at Upsalla University
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
TypeStudent thesis, text

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