The Cranes Are Flying
The Cranes Are Flying • 1h 36m
Directed by Mikhail Kalatozov • 1957 • Soviet Union
Starring Tatiana Samoilova, Alexei Batalov, Vasily Merkuryev
This landmark film by the virtuosic Mikhail Kalatozov was heralded as a revelation in the post-Stalin Soviet Union and the international cinema community alike. It tells the story of Veronica (Tatiana Samoilova) and Boris (Alexei Batalov), a couple who are blissfully in love until World War II tears them apart. With Boris at the front, Veronica must try to ward off spiritual numbness and defend herself from the increasingly forceful advances of her beau’s draft-dodging cousin. Winner of the Palme d’Or at the 1958 Cannes Film Festival, THE CRANES ARE FLYING is a superbly crafted drama with impassioned performances and viscerally emotional, gravity-defying cinematography by Kalatozov’s regular collaborator Sergei Urusevsky.
Up Next in The Cranes Are Flying
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Ian Christie on THE CRANES ARE FLYING
In this interview, filmed by the Criterion Collection in September 2019, film scholar Ian Christie explains the delicate sociopolitical context in which THE CRANES ARE FLYING was released and how it represents a turning point in Soviet cinema.
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Mikhail Kalatozov
The following illustrated audio is from an interview with director Mikhail Kalatozov that was conducted by film critic Gideon Bachmann in July 1961, at the second Moscow International Film Festival.
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The Road to Cannes
In this brief interview from 2001, filmmaker Claude Lelouch recalls visiting Moscow during the filming of THE CRANES ARE FLYING and his instrumental role in getting the film to play at the 1958 Cannes Film Festival.
