Bezhin Meadow (Бежин луг, Bezhin lug) is a 1937 Soviet film famous for having been suppressed and believed destroyed before its completion. Directed by Sergei Eisenstein, it tells the story of a young farm boy whose father attempts to betray the government for political reasons by sabotaging the year’s harvest and the son’s efforts to stop his own father to protect the Soviet state, culminating in the boy’s murder and a social uprising.
The film draws its title from a story by Ivan Turgenev, but is based on the life of Pavlik Morozov, a young Russian boy who became a political martyr following his death in 1932, after he denounced his father to Soviet government authorities and subsequently died at the hands of his family. Pavlik Morozov was immortalized in school programs, poetry, music, and in film.
Bezhin Meadow (1937) movie
Genre: Drama, Silent film
Production company: Mosfilm
Directed by Sergei Eisenstein
Produced by V. Ya. Babitsky
Written by Isaak Babel, Sergei M. Eisenstein, Aleksandr Rzheshevsky
Music by Gavriil Popov, Sergei Prokofiev (reconstructed music)
Cinematography by Vladimir Nilsen, Eduard Tisse
Edited by Klavdya Alyeva
Cast:
Viktor Kartashov as Stepok
Nikolay Khmelyov as Peasant
Pyotr Arzhanov as Political Commissioner
Yekaterina Teleshova as President of Kolkhoz
Nikolai Maslov as Arsonist
Yakov Zajtsev
Stanislav Rostotskiy as Boy
Boris Zakhava as Stepok’s Father
