Soviet TV version of Lord of the Rings rediscovered after 30 years

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The Guardian

The movie was made for television in 1991, some ten years before Peter Jackson’s trilogy premiered. It’s based on The Fellowship of the Ring, and it’s believed to be the only adaptation of Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings in the Soviet Union. It aired only once on television on Leningrad Television, and then it vanished, never to be heard of again.

Leningrad Television’s successor 5TV found the film and uploaded it on YouTube (Part1, Part2).

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doriel

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The Guardian also had a review of it:

Guardian Review

Nobody had to make Khraniteli. They didn’t have the money or the means or the technology to do The Lord of the Rings justice. And yet, simply by force of spirit alone, it’s unforgettable. I’m never going to watch it again, because I’m not an animal, but I’m glad I watched it once.

I’m tempted to watch it, but I don’t think that I could stand it!

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Once upon a very long time ago, I watched a Russian science-fiction series about a group of Soviet explorers that went to Venus and had (scary, dangerous, amazing) adventures there while looking around. Maybe someone here knows what was the name of the series? I only remember that I watched it in the then called “The Science Fiction Channel”, so long ago that “Science Fiction” then did not even include interviewing people who talked to the dead, or claimed to do it.

As to “The Lord of he Rings”: Once upon a time, in Australia, I had an American girlfriend who was very keen on the books, so we read to each other successive chapters. I did not really liked the books that much, but I did like that girlfriend enough to keep at it. Years later, the first movie of the series came out and everyone went on and on about what a terrific breakthrough in CGI this movie was, with all those Orcs  fighting the good people, etc. And it was certainly worth having a look. But, you know, that aside, I never liked those movies that much either. There, I said it.

Now, what did the Russians made out of it? They must have been exceptionally fond of Tolkien’s work to do it, given the difficulties that Alex has mentioned.

Very intriguing, I think.

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I like the series and have it in my movie collection. I also walked some of the places the movies have been shot in New Zealand.

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OscarCP

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Which Soviet series is that? Lord of the Rings, or Venus? And where can be found these days?

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The “The Lord of The Rings” series 🙂

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OscarCP

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I had a little serach for your mystery series, but the best I could find was a film called “Planeta Bur”. This probably isn’t what you were thinking of, though. I guess that series are less likely to have records of them than films.

I’m going to have to side with Alex on liking the Lord of the Rings films. I think that they’re fantastic fantasy. The Hobbit films, on the other hand, not so much…

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OscarCP

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[OscarCP]

For my money, I think that the fantasy series of movies based on Rowling’s Harry Potter novels is the best fantasy series of movies since, well, forever, or… wait … maybe the Big Bang? Not sure which, let’s just say since before there were such things as “movies”, OK?

Another pretty good fantasy series now in progress is the UK-produced cinematic version of Philip Pullman “His Dark Materials”, now with the first two books: “The Golden Compass — or “Northern Lights” (no need to get into a transatlantic shouting match about it), as well as “The Subtle Knife” already taken care of and “The Amber Spyglass” under construction and somewhat delayed by the pandemic. Also available from HBO.

I liked the novels, to a point. Because Pullman’s obsession with Milton’s “Paradise Lost”, at times was a bit too much for me. Particularly since I never really liked “Paradise Lost” with its over 10,000 lines of unrhymed iambic pentameter and all. Sorry, Milton and your nice and helpful daughters. That’s how it is with me.

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• This reply was modified 2 years, 5 months ago by OscarCP.

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OscarCP : First Spaceship On Venus (1960) (a.k.a. in German: Der Schweigende Stern; in Polish: Milcząca Gwiazda; in English: The Silent Star (also Planet of the Dead and Spaceship Venus Does Not Reply) movie is a 1960 East German/Polish color science fiction film, directed by Kurt Maetzig, that stars Günther Simon, Julius Ongewe, and Yoko Tani. The film was first released by VEB Progress Film-Vertrieb in East Germany. It is based on the science fiction novel The Astronauts by Stanisław Lem…

Full Movie on YouTube

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OscarCP

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Alex: This might be what I saw many years ago on TV, only divided in weekly installments. The subdued color is more or less how I remember it. The dubbing is really good, with the characters’ mouth movements and the corresponding English words convincingly put together. I haven’t read the novel by Lem the movie is based on; it was the first he wrote and, from what I’ve read about it, he had to make many concessions to make sure it was going to be approved by the Communist censors. For that reason he did not much like his own book. The movie, though, does not seem very political.

Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).

MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
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From YouTube :

“In 1962 the much-shortened, 79 minute, dubbed release from Crown International Pictures substituted the title “First Spaceship on Venus” for the English-speaking market. The film was released theatrically in the U.S. in 1962 on a double bill with the 1958 Japanese film Varan the Unbelievable. First Spaceship On Venus was later featured in episodes of both Mystery Science Theater 3000 and Cinema Insomnia.”

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OscarCP

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Thank you for this hidden gem, Alex! this is great, I added to my what-to-watch list. My girlfriend is from Ukraine, so whe will help me with translation, where subtitles are not enough!

As a reward I offer Sexmission, old polish movie, about world without men. Its funny, its interesting and in many ways, its realistic. You shouldnt regret watching it.

Im also interested in: First Spaceship On Venus (1960).

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OscarCP, Alex5723

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There are no subtitles, so good luck!

I tried watching some of it and I now have many regrets.

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Yes, there are. Turn on the subtitles and select automatic translation (to english preferably). They are bad, I admit, but still better than nothing. We know the book, we know the movie from mr. Jackson, so in overall, we know whats happening 😀

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Sky

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My mistake! I had no idea that function was even there. Thank you for showing me.

Maybe I’ll give it another go. Maybe.

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doriel

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Glad to help, these unorthodox movies are usually “hard to swallow”, even with regular subtitles/dabbing, I know that feeling 😀
It takes some patience to see them whole.

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doriel wrote:

As a reward I offer Sexmission, old polish movie, about world without men. Its funny, its interesting and in many ways, its realistic. You shouldnt regret watching it.

Watched Sexmission today. Quite entertaining.

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