Soviet poets, talking bedbugs, and the kitchen sink of avant-garde cinema.
This little-seen and little-discussed film combines animation with self-reflexive, live action segments to embody the anarchic, satiric spirit of the poet and playwright Vladimir Mayakovsky (1893-1930). The film also showcases Sergei Yuktevich's fondness for formal experimentation. It is nominally adapted from Mayakovsky's play "The Bedbug" and his screenplay "Forget All About the Fireplace."
Direction
Yutkevich's formal experiments age like volatile wine.
Production
Live action/animation fusion that shouldn't work but absolutely does.
Writing
Mayakovsky's own texts, weaponized and worshipped simultaneously.
Director
Sergei Yutkevich
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Yutkevich was the last surviving major director of Soviet montage; this was his anarchic farewell.
The 'Forget All About the Fireplace' screenplay was itself unfilmed in Mayakovsky's lifetime—Yutkevich finally realized it fifty years late.
SU
