A circus becomes a cage becomes a revolution. Soviet war cinema that'll wreck you.
In one of the occupied European cities, the commandant of the garrison gathers a troupe of circus performers. Coming from different countries, they are in the humiliating position of people forced to serve their enslavers. Many of them, recruited from camps and workhouses, were quite content with their lot. Only after a chain of subsequent events, the artists raise an uprising. Unarmed people are not able to resist the arrived guards. They die, but at the cost of their lives they regain their lost human dignity.
Acting
Volodina's Masha burns with quiet fury.
Cinematography
Black-and-white shadows that choke.
Direction
Samsonov makes the circus feel like a trap closing.
Director
Samson Samsonov
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Rare Soviet co-production with Poland and Latvia, made during the Thaw when such grim endings were briefly permissible.
Based on real circus performers who resisted Nazi occupiers; the film was banned in some Warsaw Pact countries for being 'too depressing.'
SU
