Laureate of the Venice and Cannes Film Festivals Andrei Tarkovsky did not enjoy recognition in the USSR. At home, his films were criticized and censored, and abroad they were awarded awards. In 1982, Tarkovsky went to Italy to shoot the film Nostalgia - and never returned. After a series of shocks, he contracted lung cancer and died on December 29, 1986 - exactly 35 years ago. He talks about how the last years of Tarkovsky's life in emigration went.

The Motherland did not appreciate

In 1962, Andrei Tarkovsky shot his first full-length film - the war drama Ivan's Childhood. At the Venice Film Festival she received the Golden Lion. Then the director started to work on the film "Andrei Rublev". Production proceeded slowly as Soviet officials criticized and censored the plot for being dark and anti-patriotic. In addition, Tarkovsky was accused of cruelty to animals - it was reported that on the set of Andrei Rublev, a horse was thrown off a cliff and a cow was burned. However, this film subsequently received the FIPRESCI prize and was recognized as the main one in the director's career.

Tarkovsky's sci-fi drama Solaris (1972), which won the Grand Prix at the Cannes Film Festival, was also received controversially in the USSR. Writer Stanislav Lem was dissatisfied with the adaptation of his novel, as stated in an interview with the magazine "Soviet Screen". Lem also sent a letter to Mosfilm that the script for the film was too far from the original book: “The screenwriter introduced a large number of characters, as well as incidents that do not exist in the original”.

At the same time abroad "Solaris" is considered one of the greatest sci-fi films in the history of world cinema - wrote about this The Guardian and "BBC".

Many sources (IMDB, BBC, Reddit) have included Tarkovsky's autobiographical film The Mirror (1977) in the list of the best films of all time. And in the USSR, the tape was criticized for its political context. After watching the film, the chairman of the State Film Agency Philip Yermash said: “We, of course, have freedom of creativity! But not to the same extent! " The picture was not censored, but was released in Soviet distribution in a small print run.

While working on the film "Stalker" (1979) based on the story of the Strugatsky brothers "Roadside Picnic", Tarkovsky also encountered difficulties. The director was not satisfied with the script, which was rewritten many times and led to an increase in the budget of the tape. Also, Tarkovsky had problems getting the necessary financial and technical support from the state. And in 1977, due to the marriage of the film, the summer-autumn expedition of the film crew near Tallinn was in vain.

After that, Tarkovsky suffered a heart attack, but completed work on the painting. Before Stalker received the prize at the Cannes Film Festival, the Soviet press did not pay attention to the film. Under the influence of Western recognition, in 1978, Tarkovsky was nevertheless awarded the title of People's Artist of the RSFSR.

Filming in Italy

Tarkovsky has been waiting for permission to shoot Nostalgia in Italy for more than three years. The screenwriter Tonino Guerra, who worked with Federico Fellini and Michelangelo Antonioni, helped him to negotiate with the Soviet authorities. Having obtained the necessary documents for himself and his wife, in 1982 Tarkovsky flew to Rome. Tarkovsky's son Andrei stayed with his grandmother in the USSR.

“When my father left, my grandmother and I were left hostages in the Soviet Union,” Tarkovsky Jr. said in an interview with AiF. - I have been waiting for four years when they will still allow me to see my dad. But the Soviet authorities, naturally, were not profitable to let me go: they were sure that sooner or later my father would not stand it and would return. After all, he loved me very much. "

The director arrived in Italy on March 7, 1981, and on April 4, 1982, he celebrated his 50th birthday. But in the Soviet press, his anniversary was ignored.

The production of the Soviet-Italian drama Nostalgia ended in 1983. The film won the Best Director Award in Cannes, as well as the Ecumenical Jury and FIPRESCI Prizes.

Conflict with the USSR

In the summer of 1983, Tarkovsky sent a letter to Yermash asking him to give him the opportunity to return to the USSR in three years. The Goskino memorandum notes that such a step "is hardly a consequence of the failure in Cannes," from where Tarkovsky "planned to return with the main prize."

"Focusing on his own egocentric understanding of the artist's moral duty, Tarkovsky apparently hopes that in the West he will be free from the class influence of bourgeois society and will be able to create, regardless of its laws," the Goskino said in a statement. iTarkovsky was denied the required permission and tried to persuade him to return. The director was promised to consider the possibility of implementing contracts for the production of the opera "Boris Godunov" in London, as well as for the shooting of the film "Hamlet" at the expense of the Stockholm private film school. Despite these persuasions, as well as the fact that his son and mother remained in the USSR, Tarkovsky was adamant.

In 1984, at a press conference in Milan, the director announced that he did not intend to return to the Soviet Union. After that, films of the classics of world cinema were banned from showing at home.

Later, Tarkovsky's son said that initially the director did not plan to stay abroad. According to Andrei Tarkovsky Jr., his father was struck by the "betrayal" of Sergei Bondarchuk, who was a member of the jury in Cannes and allegedly opposed the award of the main prize to Nostalgia. Tarkovsky also felt that upon returning to his homeland, he would most likely be made restricted to travel abroad.

“Apparently, in Moscow then they simply could not understand that he was not going to stay in the West forever, but really only wanted to do work, which he had no opportunity to do in his homeland. But in the end this misunderstanding and this alienation from home cost him dearly, it literally finished him off. Nevertheless, he told me that this was the only possible solution, because the main thing in life for him has always been to work, ”said Tarkovsky Jr.

Further work in Europe

In 1983, Tarkovsky held successful negotiations with the London theater Covent Garden and began staging his first opera - "Boris Godunov" by Modest Mussorgsky. By the end of 1984 he had established a relationship with the Swedish Film Institute and began work on the film Sacrifice. The filming took place on the island of Gotland. Later, Tarkovsky's assistant and translator Leila Alexander-Garrett published the book “Andrei Tarkovsky. The Dream Collector ", in which she spoke about the prophecies of" Sacrifice ".

“Later I learned that in the first version of the script, the hero of the picture was terminally ill: he had cancer. They say that a real artist sees his own destiny, and sometimes the destiny of humanity, - wrote Alexander-Garrett. - The premiere of "Sacrifice" coincided with the catastrophe in Ukraine almost day in and day out. All Westerners wrote that Tarkovsky foresaw Chernobyl. ”

In January 1986, for the first time in the years of emigration, Tarkovsky met his 16-year-old son - the teenager was allowed to leave for Paris thanks to an appeal by French President Francois Mitterrand to Mikhail Gorbachev. By that time, doctors had already diagnosed Tarkovsky with cancer. According to the wife of Tarkovsky's sister, Alexander Gordon, the Soviet authorities knew about the director's diagnosis, but did not talk about it to the family for a long time.

Sickness and death

When the shooting of Sacrifice was almost over, Tarkovsky fell ill. Following a medical examination in December 1985, he was diagnosed with lung cancer. Actress Marina Vlady helped the director with housing in Paris and got him into a clinic. Tarkovsky was watched by Vladi's husband, the famous oncologist Leon Schwarzenberg. Being in serious condition, Tarkovsky continued to edit "Sacrifice". The director passed away on December 29, 1986.

Tarkovsky's funeral took place on January 5, 1987 at the Russian cemetery of Sainte-Genevieve-des-Bois near Paris. Fans of his work from Italy, Germany and other European countries arrived to say goodbye to the director. There was no official delegation from the USSR: only relatives arrived. A wreath with the inscription "From the Union of Cinematographers" was laid on the grave of Tarkovsky by the Soviet embassy.

“Officials did not yet understand who Tarkovsky was now - an immigrant defector or an internationally recognized Russian director,” Gordon noted.

First, Tarkovsky was buried in the grave of Esaul Vladimir Grigoriev, and a year later his ashes were moved to a new place, which was allocated by the mayor of the city of Sainte-Genevieve-des-Bois. In 1990, Tarkovsky was posthumously awarded the Lenin Prize.

bbabo.Net