Summer Guests (1967)

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Movie
German title Summer guests
Original title Дачники
Country of production USSR
original language Russian
Publishing year 1967
length 104 minutes
Rod
Director Boris Babotschkin
Jelena Skatschko
script Boris Babotschkin
production Mosfilm
camera Nikolai Vlasov
cut Valentina Korovkina
occupation

Sommergäste (Original title: Дачники , Datschniki ) is a Soviet feature film directed by Boris Babotschkin and Jelena Skatschko from 1967 based on the drama of the same name by Maxim Gorki from 1904.

action

In the summer of 1904 normal life took place in a dacha settlement . Here Pavel Sergejewitsch Ryumin lurks around in the forest until Varvara Mikhailovna Bassova crosses his path in order to confess his love to her. When she explains briefly to him that she does not love him, he looks for a bench to shoot himself with grief. At the moment when he is looking for the cheapest place on his chest with a pistol, he is disturbed by a gentleman who cannot find the summer house of the civil engineer Petr Ivanovich Suslov. This gentleman, it is Semyon Semjonowitsch Dvojetotschije, continues to wander through the settlement to find Suslov, since he is his uncle, who has not seen him for ten years. The lawyer Sergei Wassilewitsch Bassow complains to his wife Varvara, who has meanwhile returned home, about her brother Vlas Michailowitsch, who has recently become lazy and unpunctual and asks her to ensure that he is more attentive to his duties. Suslov arrives a little later to pick up the lawyer. After his departure, Varvara does not confront her brother, but pours out her heart to him that she would rather go where simple, healthy people live who speak another language and do a serious, great work that helps everyone. She gets to the point by saying that she is dissatisfied with life, which her brother also claims of himself.

Dvojetochie has now found his nephew and is now sitting at the table with him and Basov, enjoying dinner. Here he talks about his experiences in the past few years, when he also sold his factory. He only kept one house in the city and now he has nothing more to do than just count his money, which is why he has to struggle with the boredom. Meanwhile, other residents of the summer houses are strolling through the beautiful grounds on this beautiful evening, talking, joking with each other and visiting Varvara Bassowa in their house like a raid. Sonja, the daughter of the widowed doctor Marja Lwowna, disappears into the open with the student Simin Maxim again to let him tell her something about eternal love, as she tells her mother. Then the doctor Kirill Akimowitsch Dudakow enters the house, meets his wife Olga Alexejewna, whom he does not want to see. He wants to make an appointment with Ryumin for the next day, where he wants to talk to him about the educational methods in the colony of young offenders, but he immediately uses the opportunity to get rid of his problems with the mayor and the whole world. Because he does this in public, his wife feels very offended, leaves the house and her husband follows her. Now Basov's sister, Kalerija Wassiljewna, complies with the request of the guests who are still present to recite her verses, newly written for the benefit of the children's colony, which put all visitors in a sad mood.

The next day, Basow and his guest, who arrived yesterday evening, the poet Yakov Petrovich Shalimov, go to the river to swim. During the subsequent walk, the point is that Shalimov has not written anything for a long time, because he has lost his reader because of his age. But Bassow encourages him that he will find his reader again after a certain amount of time in the summer. On the way they meet Suslow with his uncle, who is slowly getting on the engineer's nerves. Sonja and Simin sit in a quiet corner, who swear their loyalty because the student has to say goodbye for three weeks. A major discussion is now taking place in Basov's house about what a Russian poet should be like. Everything that Marja Lvovna wants to see in one, she does not find in Shalimov, which she says directly to his face. At that moment Wlas comes down the stairs and tries to loosen up the mood with some funny singing, which Marja doesn't like, which is why she goes outside. Wlas follows her and says that he only wants people who are laughing, that he likes and does not love all the people in the house, which is why he asks Marja to go out with him. Meanwhile, the quarrel continues in the house until everyone slowly disperses and Varvara, who wants to support Shalimov, expresses the desire to awaken everyone's awareness of their dignity so that no one offends the other. But people are not capable of this, which is painful and regrettable for them. In the garden she meets Olga Alexejewna, who cries over her many children and living with her husband. Olga also becomes very unobjective, accusing Varvara of her beautiful life and that she was somehow able to arrange not to have children. The last accusation, in particular, took Varvara very upset, but luckily Semyon Semyonovich came by and defused the situation with his presence. Both decide to go for a little walk and while Varvara gets a scarf for it, the jealous Suslov comes by, who has been looking for his wife Julia Filippovna all day. When he finally finds her, accompanied by Basov's assistant Nikolai Petrovich Samyslow, who says goodbye for a short time, he makes a scene for her, threatens to shoot her, but she can only laugh about it.

After seeing a play on the open-air stage of the settlement, the company takes several boats to the other side of the river for a picnic . Here the women and men talk separately. On this occasion, Varvara is asked why she does not leave her stuffy husband. She should rather go away or fall in love, the main thing is to break up with him. Since the talks are against the men, Julija Filippovna throws in that her husband has only spoiled her imagination and that he has also aroused curiosity about the man. For that she is now spoiling his life. Suddenly a happy Vlas runs into Varvara, who has just come from Marja, who asks Varvara to come to her for a moment. Here she complains of her problem, as Wlas confessed to her that he loves her even though she already has gray hair. She is very unhappy and sorry for herself, but only because she loves him too. At the same time, Samyslov and Yulia Filippovna row away from the others to indulge in physical love over a haystack. After Samyslow leaves, Julija discovers her completely drunk husband on the other side of the haystack. Meanwhile, Varvara and the poet have also met for a conversation in which he is courting her. She tells him how she loved a book and him as a young girl and looked up to him until this evening, because it turns out that he is no different from all men and that hurts her now.

Suslow's uncle is already saying goodbye to the residents of the summer resort, because he wants to leave the next day and also takes Warwara's brother Wlas with him. Both want to use Semyon Semyonovich's money to build two high schools, one for girls and one for boys, which goes back to a suggestion by Warwara when he once said that he did not know what to do with his wealth except to bequeath it . He would love to take Varvara with him, who in his opinion has no place in the circles gathered here, but which she refuses because she has learned nothing. In the house of the Bassows a little party is being prepared to mark his farewell. But before that, the news goes around that two construction workers have been buried on one of the construction sites of the civil engineer Suslov, a construction site that he has never visited and checked, which arouses the anger of some of those present.

Samyslow interjects that all of them here are complicated people and that is precisely why they are among the best in the country, that is, they belong to the intelligentsia . Varvara contradicts this and expresses that they are summer guests in their country who do nothing but talk an awful lot. There are many lies in their conversations, they talk about the tragedy of life without knowing it, they like to moan, complain and moan. She is certain that hundreds, even thousands, of healthy people perish as a result. For her words she receives support from Ryumin, Suslow's uncle, her brother and Marja Lvovna, who also joins her speech. They are all children of laundresses, cooks, workers who have to be different. There have never been any educated people in this country who were connected to the mass of the people. There must be an ardent desire to expand, change and illuminate the lives of these people, who have toiled all their lives and suffocated in pain and darkness, and not just out of compassion and mercy. They sent us ahead to find a better life, but we have moved away from them and lost each other. Basov uses a short pause to announce his sister Kalerija Wassiljewna, who will recite some of her verses. After a very weak applause, Wlas answers, who also wants to recite his own texts, but in which one can discover an ostensibly revolutionary direction. Suslov immediately names Marya Lvovna as the source and muse of the poet's inspiration, she has put him in the mood to expose others. An objection that Wlas wants to raise is shouted down by Suslov. He goes on to explain why a large number of those present have reasons for wanting to live differently. They are all children of the petty bourgeoisie and poor people, they worked enough and starved enough in their youth, so it is understandable that now they want to eat, drink and rest a lot when they are more mature. He is a Russian citizen and doesn't care about the chatter, appeals and ideas that Marja Lvovna spreads, he wants to live as it suits him. With these words, he leaves the house, and Varvara confirms that he was more righteous than anyone else. He was rude, but he was ruthless in telling the truth.

In this exciting situation, Varvara does not notice that Ryumin is saying goodbye forever, as he emphasizes, which is why he goes outside excitedly. Suddenly a guard whistled the alarm, as he found Ryumin lying and wounded on a bench. He had tried to kill himself with a pistol, but he was unsuccessful because, according to him, his heart is too small and pounding too hard that he could not hit it. It only hit his shoulder and this injury is not dangerous, says Doctor Dudakov. Ryumin cites his unrequited love for Varvara as the reason for the suicide attempt and also states that he lived as an unsuccessful person and was not even able to die.

At the end of the evening, Varvara calls out for the big reckoning. She hates all of life in this society with never-ending hatred. She describes those present as pathetic people and unhappy cripples. She receives verbal support from her brother, who claims that everyone is in disguise, but he will tear off the rags with which they try to hide their mendacity, the narrow-mindedness and poverty of their feelings. Varvara adds that these people have mutilated her soul and poisoned her life, which gives her the right to speak like that. When Bassow tries to calm her down and addresses her as a girlfriend, she replies that he was never her boyfriend and she was never his girlfriend, they were nothing more than man and woman and now they are strangers. Together with her brother, Marja Lvovna and her daughter, she goes into a new life, while the rest of society remains affected in which Julia Filippovna takes her husband by the arm in order to continue her previous life with him.

Production and publication

The film, shot as a black and white film, premiered on September 25, 1967 under the title Dachnik in the Soviet Union .

A performance in the German-speaking area could not be verified, with the exception of a performance on May 26, 2019 in the Berlin Russian House of Science and Culture

Web links