The Long Farewell: screening
Date and time:
Monday 18 March, 2024
20:00 - 21:30
Location:
The Garden Cinema
39-41 Parker Street WC2B 5PQ
London
WC2B 5PQ
This event is part of Ukrainian Retrospective, an educational program dedicated to Ukrainian cinema history in partnership with the Ukrainian Institute London and the Dovzhenko Center.
The screening will be preceded by a pre-recorded introduction from Bohdan Zhuk, programmer Molodist Kyiv International Film Festival.
Kira Muratova's The Long Farewell depicts a seemingly banal story of a jealous and possessive mother and her aloof and lonely son. Growing up without a father, who left the family long ago, Sasha finally visits him during the summer holidays to work with him on an archaeological expedition. As a result, Sasha desires independence and a move to Novosibirsk. But this only causes his mother's attempts to keep him at home to grow more persistent. The story evolves into an analysis of alienation between genders, and misunderstandings between generations against the background of a frighteningly bleak and dehumanized Soviet reality.
The Long Farewell was labelled as dissident, counterrevolutionary, and anti-Soviet, and banned for 16 years. Because of this, the Head of the Odesa Film Studio was fired, alongside the chairman of the Ukrainian State Committee for Cinematography. Muratova was permanently suspended from filmmaking, and thereafter worked as a librarian for several years. Shot in 1971, the picture was released only in 1987.
