The Cranes Are Flying

Writing in VL-7/02, reviewer Tom Rich said 'Boris (Alexei Batalov) and Veronica (Tatiana Samoliva) have a nice romantic relationship developing…until Boris volunteers to fight for Stalin when the Germans invade in 1941. After a year passes with no word, Veronica, who assumes the worst, reluctantly agrees to marry his cousin, although she still hasn’t given up hope that Boris will someday return. While the plot of Mikhail Kalatozov’s film is simple, the production itself is technically impressive, especially for a 1957 postwar Soviet film. With deep-focus black-and-white cinematography incorporating a panoply of handheld tracking shots, dramatically angled close-ups, and other expressive techniques that serve the story rather than merely call attention to themselves, The Cranes Are Flying is a bold stylistic achievement.' Re-released on DVD and bowing on Blu-ray with a stellar 2K digital transfer, extras include a new interview with scholar Ian Christie, a 1961 audio interview with the director, the 2009 documentary Hurricane Kalatozov on the director, a segment from a 2008 program about the film’s cinematography, a 2001 interview with filmmaker Claude Lelouch on the film’s 1958 premiere at Cannes, and an essay by critic Chris Fujiwara. Highly recommended. (R. Pitman)