Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors

Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors

Directed by Sergei Parajanov • 1965 • USSR/Ukraine

The first mature masterpiece from one of world cinema’s true poets, Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors bursts with imagination. Grounded in the folk traditions, aesthetics, and dialect of the Hutsul people of western Ukraine, Parajanov’s tale of forbidden love between star-crossed Ivan and Marichka showcases his trademark visual exuberance. This magical realist triumph established Parajanov as one of the Soviet Union’s pre-eminent auteurs.

SHADOWS OF FORGOTTEN ANCESTORS • ТІНІ ЗАБУТИХ ПРЕДКІВ
Directed by Sergei Parajanov
Written by Sergei Parajanov and Ivan Chendej
From the novel by Mikhail Kotsyubinskiy
Cinematography by Yuri Ilyenko
Music by Myroslav Skoryk
Starring: Ivan Mykolaichuk, Larisa Kadochnikova, Tatyana Bestayeva

In Ukrainian and Hutsul with English subtitles

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Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors
  • Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors

    Directed by Sergei Parajanov • 1965 • USSR/Ukraine

    The first mature masterpiece from one of world cinema’s true poets, Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors bursts with imagination. Grounded in the folk traditions, aesthetics, and dialect of the Hutsul people of western Ukraine, Parajanov’s tale of for...

Extras

  • Introducing Ukrainian poetic cinema

    Klassiki curator Sam Goff introduces viewers to the world of Ukrainian poetic cinema: a formally radical and politically subversive movement that emerged in Kyiv in the mid-1960s, and which turned to Ukraine’s folkloric past in order to reimagine the nation’s cinematic future.

  • Video Essay: The director the Soviets couldn’t break

    The USSR jailed Sergei Parajanov twice; but then a Soviet chief handed him the keys to a film studio. From the wild folk poetry of Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors to the living tableaux of The Colour of Pomegranates, the Armenian master built a cinema unlike anything before or since. We explore ho...

  • Video Essay: The films that made Robert Eggers

    Everyone knows Robert Eggers, director of The Witch, The Northman, and Nosferatu, one of the most singular voices in American cinema.

    Fewer know where he finds influence. Again and again, in interviews and in a whole programme of films he personally curated, Eggers points East. We trace the Eas...

  • Notes on Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors

    270 KB

  • Sergei Parajanov Bibliography

    50 KB