The Red Snowball Tree

The Red Snowball Tree (Kalina Krasnaya) (1974)

Runtime: 110 minutes

Directed by: Vasilly Shukshin

Starring: Shukshin, Lidiya Fedoseeva-Shukshin, Ivan Ryzhov, Mariya Skvortsova, Aleksky Vanin

From: Mosfilm

It’s no Goncharov but this is the most popular movie ever made in the Soviet Union. It’d take too long to explain why this became a meme on Tumblr but because reasons, the users on that platform went buckwild and created an entire lore to a fictional 1973 movie called Goncharov, which had Scorsese’s involvement in some way-the lore isn’t always exact.

It was about Russian gangsters in Naples which had a cast that included De Niro, Pacino, Hackman, Keitel, Cybill Shepherd and John Cazale-I do wish the movie was an actual thing; there’s homoeroticism, a fascination with clocks & an ice pick killer. There is a LOT created, whether it be fanart, quotes, or footage that’s actually taken from 70’s movies involving those actors. Allegedly, some think this meme is a spoof on people like us talking about obscure films but they’re probably reading WAY too much into it to try and rationalize something that’s a goof.

Sorry for this long opening but I have to explain why I saw a movie that’s obscure to many; a few months ago during time spent in a rabbit hole, I was at the Wiki page of the most popular movies in the history of the Soviet Union. Besides Russian films the list also has some Hollywood films then that well must have dried up as films from India then appear. Well, in all the times it’s been released, this is the most popular-an estimated 140 million tickets. Thankfully for everyone, it is on Mosfilm’s official YouTube channel; it’s not the first time I’ve taken advantage of all the movies they have, only some of which has English subtitles but there’s still enough where I can’t complain… plus, they have a selection of 4K video to boot, including this.

To tie it all together, the plot of this revolves around criminals; specifically, a felon is released from prison and he’s thinking of laying low before returning to his former life… but his lady pen pal friend Lyuba is able to sway him otherwise. Him trying to be an Average Joe (or I suppose in this case, Average Ivan) is quite the struggle although eventually he earns the trust of Lyuba, her family and even the small village they live in. You can probably guess what happens in the final act…

To state the obvious, I don’t fully understand Soviet life-especially during the last few decades it was a thing-so its enduring popularity is somewhat still a mystery to me. Then again, its writer/director/star Vasily Shukshin died shortly after this came out so perhaps him passing away in his mid-40’s was part of it… either way it was a very good movie which managed to be pretty moving as eventually I sympathized w/ the protagonist despite his thief past. As Lyuba was played by Vasily’s real-life wife Lidiya, it wasn’t too surprising that they had quality chemistry with each other. It was well-made and none other than Fassbinder said that this was one of his favorites. I’m glad that a movie which has many elements that work in the West can easily be watched.

By the by, a Red Snowball tree is a shrub known as a guelder rose; that’s the plant shown on the current poster for the film. Its meaning is revealed near the very end.