Category talk:Russian films

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Something like this would probably make sense: Category:Films of Russia in other languages. Or not? Mikkalai 17:55, 20 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Please stop reverting the page without discussion, or you will be blocked. mikka (t) 19:20, 23 July 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Russian/Russian language

(moved from talk pages)

Hi, What is the story with the edit wars about Category:Russian films and Category:Russian language films? On the surface, it seems that films like Potemkin are Soviet films and Russian language films, but not Russian films. I haven't found any discussion about this anywhere, or any dialogue between you and the other anonymous editor. I'm just wondering what is going on. -- Samuel Wantman 20:14, 23 July 2005 (UTC)

The deal is that an anon is aggressively recategorizing without any discussion and calling names from the very beginning. Some time ago I left a message at this anon's talk page and recently at category:Russian films. My position is if a film is created in Russia, it is a Russian film. Soviet Union was a union, you know, even if formal. And there were Armenian, Belarussian, Lithuanian films among the Soviet ones. I see no reason why 70 years of say, Ukrainian culture must be swallowed by a "Soviet" one. And I don't buy this idiotic accusation in "nationalism": culture is a national trait, not a political one. And Potemkin is shot by Mosfilm, i.e., it is a Russian one (and a soviet as well). mikka (t) 21:02, 23 July 2005 (UTC)

It took me a while to understand, and perhaps part of the problem is that the distinctions between the different categories are not very clear. It seems that Russian language films should be a sub-category of films by language and Russian films should be a subcategory of films by country. Perhaps Russian films should NOT be a subcategory of Russian language films. Is absolutely every film produced in Russia a Russian language film? It seems at least possible that some minority film-maker could make a film in Russia without it being in the Russian language. Without the overlap of language and geography, films could be in BOTH categories instead of either/or. Likewise, they might also be Soviet era films. These distinctions should be made clearer on the category pages. The current arrangement seems a little counter intuitive to me. -- Samuel Wantman 23:18, 23 July 2005 (UTC)

There are two problems here. One is screwed up history of Russia and other states that went thru the Spvoet Union times. From one hand, Soviet culture/history is something unique and deserves its own category. From the other hand, all countries like Estonia, Ukraine, Russia, etc., have rights for their own continuity. As for the language, please keep in mind that categories are for convenience, not for some formal rules. I introduced the category:Russian language films to cover the films made not in Russia. There is no other categories of this type, like category:French language films. This again is the Soviet Union peculiarity. Nearly all notable films made in Soviet Union existed in Russian language. And all notable films made in Russia are in Russian language. If ever this problem arises in future and one will really be pissed off that "cat:Russian film" is in "cat:Russian language films", one may easily replace this by putting "see also "cat:Rus films" into the "cat:Rus lang films." But at the moment I see no reason to do this. Like I said, category:Russian language films is an exception of the kind. mikka (t) 06:56, 24 July 2005 (UTC)

The issue here is the common, accepted one that the Soviet Union was a single nation and, as such, attempted to develop a single identity. To this end, the film industry was nationalized and controlled by a single governmental entity which developed and enforced concepts of what constituted acceptable films. There were no separate "countries" within the Union, despite claims of "autonomous Republics", and from time to time there were even very active efforts to suppress the distinctive cultural aspects of the diverse, captive groups. For the most part also, film was viewed as the primary medium of education of the masses, and thus were under closer scrutiny than the other arts (excepting, perhaps, television). This state of affairs affected both content and structure of films made during the life of the Soviet Union, and to suggest there is a "national" difference because a film was shot by a state-run studio in Moscow vs. a state-run studio in Alma Ata seems to me to avoid the harsh reality that there was in fact NO "national continuity" for the former countries subsumed by the creation of the Soviet Union and afterwards, and trying to force one upon that reality simply convolutes history and research. I'm sorry the complainant was rough on you about that, but I have to agree, the Soviet Union and independent Russia should each have their own film categories. "Russian language films" is the best compromise category for consolidating all films made through time in that language, regardless of country of origin - Russia, Soviet Union, or elsewhere. (written by user:12.73.195.126)

Please sign your posts.

I completely agree with you in what you wrote about Soviet Union. For this reason there is category:Soviet films. However one should not confuse cultural and political topics. These are separate issues. If you want a separate category for modern Russia, the category must be "Films of Russia". If within "soviet films" there will be a need, one may create "Films of RSFSR" (However IMO too small categories are not very convenient and better use lists).

Back to Soviet times. You say "from time to time... to suppress." You omit the second piece: in between your "from time to time", by political whims "from other time to other times" there was an opposite rhetorics about preserving national cultures.

What is more, while filmmmaking was under heavy political pressure, true artists, the ones whose films we remember now and put them into wikipedia were resisting this political dictat. There was a large number of shelved films that were seen only 10-20 years ater creation.

Stil further, despite efforts to mold the nation of "Soviet people," films created, say in Georgia are mostly truly "Georgian films", in Estonia are "Estonian films", whatever Americans may think. They are perfectly identifiable as national films. And films created in Russia were "Russian films", based on centuries of Russian culture.

As I explained, I created the category "Russian language films" to address the unique feature of the Soviet Union: many films in modern Belarus, Ukraine and Kazakhstan are in Russian language, and this is their distinctive feature, in addition to being, say "Films of Kazakhstan".

And of cource, all films created in Russia are "Russian language films" (which is reflected in categorization). I don't remember any "Komi language films" or "Chukchi language films". I may be mistaken , but of all modern Russia's autonomus republics I would expect the emergence of "Tatar language films", but they will be perfectly covered by category "Films of Tatarstan". mikka (t) 17:52, 7 August 2005 (UTC)

• • Agree, cultural and political topics should not be confused. However, you have put your "Russian films" as a subcategory of the Films by country category, not Films by culture. And it is in the title format for Films by Country - "Fooian films". Thus the confusion for the other users working on or using the category when it is in Films by Country, which categorize films by geopolitical, not cultural, factors. What you need to do is set up a separate Category for "Russian-culture films" or something like that, and then a major category "Films by culture" in which to include it. Comes to mind immediately "Armenian culture films", "Khazakhstani culture films", and even "Jewish culture films" (which subdivide in Films by country under Polish films, American films, Israeli films; and by language as Hebrew-language films and Yiddish-language films). But leaving Category: Russian films where you have it now and with the name you've given it, in Films by country, is just going to continue the reversion-war problem because it *is* a geopolitical category and the people moving the Soviet-Russian films to the Soviet film category are following the logic and purpose of the Film by country category. Bill Atwater 20:46, 7 August 2005 (UTC)