Directed by Dinara Asanova • 1983 • USSR/Russia

A former athlete leads a sports summer camp for troubled teens in this drama from Dinara Asanova. Famed for her use of improvisation, Asanova uses this chronicle of a summer to investigate the paradoxical vulnerability of these supposedly “tough” outsiders. Incisive and touching, the film dares to treat the marginalised with empathy. Too challenging for the censors, the film was shelved and only eventually released after Asanova’s tragic death.

TOUGH KIDS • ПАЦАНЫ
Directed by Dinara Asanova
Written by Yuri Klepikov
Cinematography by Yuri Veksler
Music by Vitali Chernitsky, Viktor Kisin
Starring: Olga Mashnaya, Andrei Zykov, Valeriy Priyomykhov

In Russian with English subtitles