Mariya Strelkova

Merry Fellows was the first Soviet musical comedy. Set in Odessa and Moscow in the 1930's. Shepherd Kostya Potekhin (Utyosov) is mistaken for an international concert star. He falls in love with Anyuta (Orlova) and plays the "star" for her. In a cascade of comic musical numbers he becomes the leader of a Jazz-Band and gives a hilarious show at the Odessa Music Hall. Now he is destined to perform at the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow. (imdb)

This rarely seen film was presumably a dodgy release prospect outside it's home market, with it's unstinting anti clerical content. The priests, stock market officials and police conspire to squeeze income out of pilgrims come to see relics of a Christ like figure. The con man duo beat their time by passing the lead off as the resurrected saint. (imdb)

From his early silent works, the great Russian film director, Herr Yakov Protazanov, made literary adaptations from equally great Russian writers, as is the case with "Chiny I Lyudi" ( Ranks And People ) (1929) in which three short stories by Chekhov, "Anna On The Neck", "Death Of A Petty Official" and "Chameleon" were assembled for the silent screen.

The son and daughter of a lost-at-sea captain recruit help to find him on the basis of an incomplete note found in a bottle, and encounter adventures in Patagonia, Australia, and New Zealand... (imdb)