Miners from Sobacheevka The Russian land is rich in original talents. Leonid Davidovich Lukov was just that. Having lived only 53 years, he left behind the brightest film works: The Big Life (1939), Alexander Parkhomenko (1942), Two Fighters (1943), Vassa Zheleznova (1953), Different Fates (1956). Leonid Lukov was born in Mariupol, and the beginning of his creative biography was associated with this city. In the article “How I became a director” Lukov wrote: “I remember the house in which I was born, the streets on which I ran barefoot, the smooth noise of the sea surf and steppe – gave a spacious Donbas steppes, where I was drawn all my life irresistibly.” Donbass is the land to which the director gave all the love of his heart, all the power of his talent. That is why the miners became the main characters of many of his films.
Leonid Davidovich was the son of a small bank employee. The family had no home and could barely make ends meet. Lukov began his labor activity at the age of twelve, and at the same time studied at an electric vocational school. In those years, there were two cinemas on the main street of Mariupol, or, as they were then called, illusions. It was not uncommon to see a tall black-haired young man rushing with tin boxes from one cinema to another. It was Lena Lukov, passionately in love with the young art of cinema. In order to watch all the movies for free and not miss any of them, he pledged to carry boxes of tapes from the Giant in the XX century, ensuring the demonstration of the same picture on two screens at the same time.
At the same time, he became interested in writing. Leonid Lukov was only 17 years old, he studied at the labor department and worked as a loader in tobacco warehouses, when the newly born Kiev film studio accepted his first script “Vanka and the Avenger”. “He,” writes one memoirist, “had a remarkable quality of uniting gifted youth around him.” A great sense of humor, pronounced talent were already appreciated in the team.” Lukov shot his first film in 1930, when after the organization of the Kinorabmol studio (Kharkov), he began to work as a director at the Kiev film studio. Unfortunately, not all of Lukov’s early works are available to a wide audience today. But the audience has a rare opportunity to enjoy the 1936 film “I love”.
It's an amazing movie! The script was written by the famous Russian prose writer, publicist, playwright, screenwriter Alexander Ostapovich Avdeenko. “I love” (1933) – the debut novel of the writer in great literature, which Maxim Gorky named among the deservedly beloved books by readers. In the 30s, they have not yet filmed series, so a small part of the work got into the picture of Leonid Lukov. But even from this fragment, Leonid Davidovich managed to create a small pearl. According to film critic Yevgeny Margolith, “The picture is amazing!” It can be compared with the Donskoy films, which, by the way, Lukov loved very much. Instead of a novel with a sequel, the family saga is steeply implicated in quite obvious archetypes. Cinema of incredible and unprecedented beauty. How did he do that? I suspect that on the one hand, operators and artists were painfully good, and on the other hand, Lukov really knew and loved working with actors.
The actors, indeed, were at the height: “Bulk” – a man Nikanor (Alexander Chistyakov), reeling in search of justice Ostap (Ivan Chuvelev), the incomparable in his disgustible master Butylochkin (Daniel Vvedensky), exaggerated-infantile owner of the mine (Vladimir Gardin), charming in the role of Garpin’s wife and mother (Natalia Uzhviy), unhappy in her provocative beauty Nastya (Vera Shershnev) and a number of other expressive characters from today’s play. Special mention deserves the musical component of the tape. These are not individual voiceover songs, this is a live performance that fills the frame with emotional depth.
A soulful, bright, compassionate film, the characters of which are easily recognizable today.