The Commissar

Original title: Komissar

1967
1h 50m

IMDb RATING

YOUR RATING

Klavdia Vavilova, a Red Army cavalry commissar, is waylaid by an unexpected pregnancy. She stays with a Jewish family to give birth and is softened somewhat by the experience of family life.Klavdia Vavilova, a Red Army cavalry commissar, is waylaid by an unexpected pregnancy. She stays with a Jewish family to give birth and is softened somewhat by the experience of family life.Klavdia Vavilova, a Red Army cavalry commissar, is waylaid by an unexpected pregnancy. She stays with a Jewish family to give birth and is softened somewhat by the experience of family life.

Director
- Aleksandr Askoldov
Writers
- Aleksandr Askoldov
- Vasiliy Grossman
Stars

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

7.5/10

1.7K

YOUR RATING

Director
- Aleksandr Askoldov
Writers
- Aleksandr Askoldov
- Vasiliy Grossman
Stars

See production info at IMDbPro

Awards
- 9 wins & 4 nominations

Photos65

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Top cast19

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Nonna Mordyukova

Klavdia Vavilova

Rolan Bykov

Yefim Mahazannik

Raisa Nedashkovskaya

Maria Mahazannik

Lyudmila Volynskaya

The Grandmother

Vasiliy Shukshin

The Commandant

Lyubov Kats

Children
(as Lyuba Kats)

Pavel Levin

Children
(as Pavlik Levin)

Dmitri Kleyman

Children
(as Dima Kleyman)

Marta Bratkova

Children

Igor Fishman

Children

Sergey Nikonenko

Otar Koberidze

Leonid Reutov

Chief of Staff
(as L. Reutov)

Valeri Ryzhakov

Kursant

Viktor Shakhov

Vladimir Vasilyev

Appearing

Viktor Ilichyov

Appearing
(uncredited)

Semen Morosov

Appearing
(uncredited)

Director
- Aleksandr Askoldov
Writers
- Aleksandr Askoldov
- Vasiliy Grossman
All cast & crew
Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

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Storyline

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Did you know

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Trivia
After making the film, Aleksandr Askoldov lost his job, was expelled from the Communist Party, charged with social parasitism, exiled from Moscow, and banned from working on feature films for life. He was told that the single copy of the film had been destroyed. Mordyukova and Bykov, major Soviet movie stars, had to plead with the authorities to spare him of even bigger charges. The film was shelved by the KGB for twenty years.

Connections
Featured in Women Filmmakers in Russia (1988)

User reviews20

Review

Featured review

8/10

Long suppressed Soviet film.

The story and characters are a bit thin; a female leader in the Russian Revolutionary army in 1922 is disgraced when she is found to be pregnant, and goes to live with a Jewish family, loses her hard shell and becomes a mother.

But the black and white images are truly striking and impressive, especially the fantasy sequences. They give the story a much deeper power and resonance than it would otherwise have.

Especially impressive as a first film. this was suppressed by the Moscow authorities for 20 years for it's sympathetic view of Jews and their oppression in Russia, and the implication that the USSR was complicit in knowing about and not stopping the concentration camps of WW 2.