Wings of a Serf

Wings of a Serf (1926)

DramaHistory

This SovKino production was a major early experiment in Soviet historical film about the oprichnina period of Muscovite history, combining the costumed drama and Gothic thrills of the genre with historical materialist commentary on the dialectical collision of scientific progress and patriarchal religious tyranny under Tsar Ivan the Terrible. It follows a self-taught inventor from the serf class Nikishka, whose efforts to build a flying machine incite accusations of witchcraft. Nikishka and his beloved Fima are persecuted by the feudal lord Kurlyatev, who took their village in a petty land squabble. They’re rescued when Kurlyatev’s lands are taken by the Tsar in his autocratic campaign against the feudal system. Ivan puts Nikishka to work in his linen mill, where the young serf is coveted by Tsarina Maria Temryukovna, who the Tsar’s been ignoring in favor of his cupbearer Feodor. A series of harrowing intrigues wind a bloody dance through bedchamber, feast hall, cathedral and dungeon.

Directors: Yuri Tarich, Leonid Leonidov.

Casts

	Ivan Klyukvin as Nikishka
	Leonid Leonidov as Tsar Ivan the Terrible
	Safiyat Askarova as Maria Temriukovna
	Vladimir Korsh as Tsarevich Ivan
	Nikolai Prozorovsky as Feodor Basmanov
	Sofya Garrel as Fima
	Aleksandr Zhukov as Vaska Gryaznov
	Lev Ivanov as Guard (uncredited)
	Konstantin Efimov as Metropolitan
	Ivan Kachalov as Malyuta Skuratov
	Vladimir Makarov as Lupatov
	V. Virskaya as Princess Kurlyateva
	V. Snezhinskaya as
	Ariadna Dzyubina as Khayat
	Vasiliy Savitskiy as

Crew