Vozvrashcheniye - The Return (2003)

Another sample of boring movie with many awards. The movie has 28 wins and another 12 nominations,see IMBD for details, by the way IMDB point is 8.1 with 10 thousand votes, i don't know why.This film is simply boring, i did not get its message.

The Rise and Fall Of the Russian Oligarks

This two part nice documentary tells the story of Russian oligarks, how they became rich and powerful during Yeltsin era, with their own words most of the time.And how they lost part of their wealth and power during Putin period.Very nice material with some historical footage from 90s Russia.
It is also available on Google Video.

Kızıl Yıldızdan Hilale Haydar Aliyev'in Fırtınalı Hayatı

As the book title implies, the book is the life story of Haydar Aliev, second president of Azerbaycan Republic.The author mush have really tried hard to make this a book :) There is nearly no information in it,the book contains the longest preface i've ever seen in a book.

In fact the book has only one paragraph to say "Aliev raised to power with great help from Yuri Adropov and fall from power due to conflicts with Gorbachev" and Aliev is a good man.

That is all, you can not find any valuable info about his days in Politburo[he was a full member for a very long time] or his relationships with Turkey, power strugge with Elcibey, the Armenian wars...so little.

So they made a book out of a what otherwise would be a few pages booklet.Do not waste money on this.

This book made me wonder on Aliyev's life story.I will find a better book and read his life soon.

Pera'dan Beyoglu'na

This book is one of the unknown treasures.The book tells the story of buildings[houses,hotels,state buildings] including the history, achitectural properties, famous peoples lived there once....on the Tunel-Taksim path
The author is so succesfull that the book is very fun and fluent to read.

Same author also as another book,Son Istasyon Venedik where he tells his interrail memoirs but unfortunately I could not find it anywhere...

The Red Stuff - The True Story of the Russian Race for Space (2002)

Yet another unfamous but very nice documentary. The Red Stuff tells the story of Soviet Space Program. This is very unique and valuable since all documents on this subject deal with Sputnik,Soyuz and Gagarin. This documentary tells the story of other cosmonauts with nice soviet archieve footage and interviews with people who REALLY went to space.

See DVD info on amazon.com or on IMDB.
There is another documentary on Soviet Space Program named "Red Star in Orbit" which I mentioned here.

OLIGART- The Great Russian Art Boom

This new (published in 2008) documentary is on a very interesting subject. The new elite of Russia - the oligarks- are now interested in buying art, some are buying it as investment, some are buying it for political reasons and some simply for the love of art.

The result is simple: Russian art pieces worth millions and millions of pounds!! In the documenrary there were scenes from 2 auctions, the gross amount was 11 million founds for the first one and another 9 million was collected in the second action.

As I see pre-revolutionary art is very valuable but they also buy pieces built during Soviet union and simply traveled abroad or sold for a few dolars , today they are worth millions.

Natalia Goncharova is the worlds most expensive female artist as of today.See the article.

Baroque by Taschen

Baroque is another nice Tashcen book.


Artists featured: Francesco Albani, Caravaggio, Valentin de Boulogne, Jan Breughel the Elder, Annibale Carracci, Anthonis van Dyck, Adam Elsheimer, Georg Flegel, Luca Giordano, Guercino, Frans Hals, Pieter de Hooch, Jacob Jordaens, Willem Kalf, Giovanni Lanfranco, Charles Le Brun, Johann Liss, Claude Lorrain, Batolomé Esteban Murillo, Nicolas Poussin, Mattia Preti, Rembrandt, Guido Reni, Jusepe de Ribera, Hyacinthe Rigaud, Peter Paul Rubens, Jan Stehen, Hendrick Terbrugghen, Georges de la Tour, Diego Velázquez, Willem van der Velde the Younger, Jan Vermeer, Simon Vouet, Francisco de Zubarán

Detailed info on the books is available on Taschen's site.


see my Gothic post for another Taschen book.

Gothic by Taschen

Taschen publishes great art books and Gothic is one sample.Here is the link to the whole series on amazon.

The book is published on bright, high-quality paper, starts with history and basic description of the Gothic-era then each artists gets 2 pages with one or more paintings and a short history of lige.

Artists featured: Giotto di Bondone, Duccio di Bouninsegna, Dieric Bouts, Robert Campin, Cimabue, Petrus Christus, Barthélemy d’Eyck, Jan van Eyck, Andrea da Firenze, Jean Fouquet, Nicolas Froment, Hugo van der Goes, Jaume Huguet, Stefan Lochner, Ambrogio Lorenzetti, Simone Martini, Master Bertram, Master Franke, Master of the Glatz Madonna, Master of the Paradise Garden, Master of Saint Veronica, Master Theoderich, Master of the Wilton Diptychons, Master Wittingau, Hans Memling, Lorenzo Monaco, Lukas Moser, Michael Pacher, Martin Schongauer, Rogier van der Weyden, Konrad Witz

Alla Pugacheva

I found two of her albums on the net.One is titled Best of Alla Pugacheva (2006) but i did not find such an album on any sources:) And the other is even worse, its name is only alla so I don't know which albums i am talking about but i like two albums of her :)

I like Million Roz,Primadonna,Arlekino,Madam Broshkina ...

See this blog for more info on her.

Movie Review: Ironiya Subdy- Irony of fate (1975)

I have downloaded this movie sometime ago and heard about it at few places as a nice sample of Russian cinema. IMDB point is 8.7
It was waiting in my queue of 'Russian movies to bee seen' .

Last issue of Russian Life Magazine contained a list of 10 Russian Movies to be seen which included this one also so I decided to watch it immediately.By the way the list of the magazine can be seen on this link.

The topic is funny and can only be seen in Soviet Union, it is new years eve, Zhenya's marriage proposal is accepted by Galya but he gets too drunk during celebrations and goes to Leningrad by accident :)

Well...it is Soviet era,all buildings look same even in different cities, and cities share same street names...his key opens the door of the apartment in Leningrad on the street having the same name of his house in Moscow and the fun begins...