Aelita (Russian: Аэлита), also known as Aelita:
Queen of Mars, is a silent movie directed by Soviet
filmmaker Yakov Protazanov made on Mezhrabpom-Rus
film studio and released in 1924. It was based on Alexei Tolstoy's novel of the same name. Mikhail Zharov and Igor Ilyinsky were cast in leading roles.
Though the main focus of the story is the daily lives of a small group of people during the post-war Soviet Union, the
enduring importance of the film comes from its early science fiction elements. It primarily tells of a young man, Loss, traveling
to Mars in a rocket ship, where he leads a popular uprising against
the king, with the support of Queen Aelita who has fallen in love with him after watching him through a telescope. Probably the first full-length movie about space travel,
the most notable part of the film remains its remarkable constructivist Martian
sets and costumes designed by Aleksandra Ekster. Their influence can be seen in a
number of later films, including the Flash Gordon serials and probably Fritz Lang's Metropolis. While very popular at first, the film
later fell out of favor with the Soviet government and was thus very difficult to see until after the Cold War.
Ideological significance
Yuliya Solntseva as
Aelita
During the climax of the film, Gusev (the Bolshevik revolutionary soldier) stages a
proletarian revolution with Queen Aelita's help. While these scenes may seem propagandistic,
in some ways the movie is anti-revolutionary. Both Gusev and Loss escape to Mars because of their dissatisfaction with domestic
life; Gusev's wife is over-protective and he longs for revolution, and Loss seemingly kills his wife in passionate anger.
Furthermore, Aelita allows the revolution to happen only so that she can overthrow the dictatorship that keeps her from ruling. After the army falls under the sway of the revolutionaries, Aelita
commands the soldiers to force the worker slaves back underground. Loss kills Aelita to stop her from taking over, seeing her as
his wife - he then wakes up, aware that the scenes on Mars were entirely fantasy, and goes home to find that his wife is still
alive.
Aelita's manipulation is directly opposed to what she represents to Loss, and serves as a stunning reminder of how revolution
can go wrong. The not-so-subtle implications of Aelita's manipulation of the revolution obviously point towards Lenin's own revolution. While Natasha (Loss' wife) is presented as a symbol of communism and the movie
has a decidedly pro-communist stance, revolution is carried out by flawed characters, all of whom are opposed to the domestic
life the director so lovingly presents. Indeed, Protazanov's film points not to revolution as a tool for growth, but rather
rebuilding - the Russian Revolution isn't the backdrop for the film, but rather Lenin's New
Economic Policy period of mild capitalism used for rebuilding after World War I.
Trivia
- Aelita, a song by Finnish band Cleaning Women, is
based on the movie.
See also
External links
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