- Occupation
Director - Country
USA
Landauer Helga
A Film About Anna Akhmatova
Fate granted Anna Akhmatova immense poetic talent, beauty, fame and a brilliant generation. Then came the executions of her loved ones, hunger, wars, revolutions, Soviet terror, isolation, betrayal. Yet Akhmatova emerges victorious, armed with mere words of poetry that-too dangerous to commit to paper-had to be memorized to be preserved. A Film follows this story reminiscent of an antique tragedy. Its participants, aside from the heroine, include Apollo and the muses, Dido and Aeneas from her beloved record of Purcell, Amedeo Modigliani, witches and visitors, statues and sovereigns, portraits and artists, armies and gardens, Paris and Leningrad, the storyteller and eternal chorus of milling crowds. The poet Anatoly Naiman, talks about Anna Akhmatova he knew and travels to the places she has left.
Diversions
The 20th century begins. Carefree people roam from one attraction to another, laughing, renting boats and carriages, betting, smoking, playing with sand, changing clothes, flirting. As they circle around seashore parks and streets, they look for more diversions. They are seeking for ways to distract themselves from the fact that the war is about to start, that the summer is coming to an end...
Fate granted Anna Akhmatova immense poetic talent, beauty, fame and a brilliant generation. Then came the executions of her loved ones, hunger, wars, revolutions, Soviet terror, isolation, betrayal. Yet Akhmatova emerges victorious, armed with mere words of poetry that-too dangerous to commit to paper-had to be memorized to be preserved. A Film follows this story reminiscent of an antique tragedy. Its participants, aside from the heroine, include Apollo and the muses, Dido and Aeneas from her beloved record of Purcell, Amedeo Modigliani, witches and visitors, statues and sovereigns, portraits and artists, armies and gardens, Paris and Leningrad, the storyteller and eternal chorus of milling crowds. The poet Anatoly Naiman, talks about Anna Akhmatova he knew and travels to the places she has left.
Diversions
The 20th century begins. Carefree people roam from one attraction to another, laughing, renting boats and carriages, betting, smoking, playing with sand, changing clothes, flirting. As they circle around seashore parks and streets, they look for more diversions. They are seeking for ways to distract themselves from the fact that the war is about to start, that the summer is coming to an end...
Helga Landauer was born in Moscow, Russia, where she studied Screenwriting at Russian Major Film School (VGIK), received her Bachelor's and Master of Fine Arts degree and worked on Russian National Television, writing and directing programs for broadcast. Her poems have been published and reviewed in major Russian magazines and anthologies, translated into Swedish, English and Vietnamese languages. Screenplays "Nobody Can" (1989), "The Concert" (1991) and "Patterns" (1992) have been produced into short feature films .Since 1996, she lives in the United States.Helga works as a writer and filmmaker. She has written three books of poetry ( «96 book» in 1996 «Composer» publishing House, « The Reed» in 2003 and «Poetry Works» in 2004 «Pushkinsky Fond» Publishing ). Her poems have been published and reviewed in major Russian magazines and several anthologies, the latest one released in 2005 by NLO-Publishers, Moscow and her poetry translations had been included in the bilingual American poetry series By ARS_INTERPRESS.Helga has written, produced and directed "Being Far from Venice" ( 1998 ) and feature video film "Objects in Mirror are Closer then They Appear" ( 2002 CINEPROJECTS STUDIOS ).The documentary film "A Journey of Dmitry Shostakovich", 2006, written and directed in collaboration with Oksana Dvornichenko, was premiered in Moscow, Paris (Louvre Auditorium), London (Queen Elizabeth Hall); New York (Carnegie Hall) and theatrically released in New York City by Turnstyle TV. Those films have been selected to international film festivals, including Madrid Documenta, Spain, Full Frame, USA, FIFA, Canada, among others.Her recent work is a 2 part documentary « A film about Anna Akhmatova», 2008, DAS FILMS.