Unavailable for years and then released in a version that cut at least 40 minutes from Andrei Tarkovsky’s original, “Andrei Rublev” is considered by many film critics to be one of the most important Russian films over the past two or three decades.
Columbia Pictures and Corinth Films have restored it to its initial full length, enhancing Tarkovsky’s reputation as one of the boldest and most original of the current generation of Soviet directors.
Based on the life of fifteenth century Russian monk and icon painter Andrei Rublev (Anatoli Solonitzine), this magnificently mounted epic film follows his experiences in a Russia ravaged by Tartar invaders. Rublev is shown during various times of his life–the period is vividly recreated in all its violence. The movie represents that very rare hybrid, an epic that is highly personal, expressing the feeling of an artist who is in inherent and endemic conflict with the surrounding society and its oppressive institutions.
Credits
A Mosfilm Release
185 minutes
Black and white with color sequence
Cinemascope
Screenplay: Andrei Tarkovsky and Andrei Mikhailkov-Konchalovsky
Cinematography: Vadim Youssav
Music: V. Ovtchinnikov
Cast
Andrei Roublev (Anatoli Solonitzine)
Kirill (Nikolai Sergeev)
Girl (Irma Raouch)
Boriska (Nikolai Bourliaiev)