Alfred Schnittke

During a freezing WWII winter, two Soviet partisans on a mission to gather food contend with the temperature, the occupying Germans, and their own psyches.

Pavel Ivanovich Chichikov plans to buy the titles to “dead souls” and use them as collateral to obtain a large loan. He comes to a small provincial town and begins to proposition the local landowners. These landowners are revealed to be so petty and avaricious that not even Chichikov’s amazing offer can be worked to his advantage on them. Some stall, some refuse for no obvious reasons, some promise and then renege, and others want “in on the deal.” In the end, Chichikov, having concluded that the landowners are a hopeless lot, leaves for other regions.

How far can a man overcome by a destructive passion go? And does he realize that slavish worship of irrepressible desires always entails retribution?

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Jozef embarks on a journey via a ghostly train to visit his dying father in a remote Galician sanatorium. Upon arrival, he discovers that the sanatorium exists in a realm where time is distorted—his father's death has not yet occurred, as time here lags behind the outside world by an undefined interval. Jozef's experiences become increasingly fragmented and dreamlike as he confronts various manifestations of his father, each representing different aspects of their relationship and his own psyche.

Events unfold on the estate of Pyotr Sorin, which brought together representatives of secular society - actress Irina Arkadina, the host's sister and her lover, the famous writer Trigorin. Sorin’s nephew, Konstantin Treplev, in love with a neighbor girl Nina Zarechnaya, who dreams of becoming an actress, writes for her a play that she plays in the scenery of Sorin’s garden.

Prince Stepan Kasatsky is an officer, an ardent, proud young man, and a big fan of the tsar. Kasatsky is going to marry, but at the last moment he learns from the bride that she was the mistress of the emperor. The prince is deeply disappointed in social life, he takes a monastic vow and leaves the capital. Faith in God was to save the soul, but passions and worldly temptations don't leave Kasatsky.

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Falling Star is based on three stories by the contemporary Russian writer Viktor Astafyev and centers on a young soldier on the front lines who is wounded and taken to the hospital. Once there, he muses about his childhood and a little girl he had loved - someone who could easily have grown up to be the nurse that is attending to him now. As he recuperates, he and the nurse fall in love and he very much wants to marry her. At this point, the nurse's mother comes for a visit and advises him against such an action because if they were to marry and he were subsequently killed or maimed in action - the fighting is still close to the hospital - the nurse would suffer much more than if he just left her alone. Now it is up to the soldier to make a decision one way or the other.

Rikki is a young mongoose who is adopted by a human family after nearly drowning in the river. He returns the favour by protecting them from two murderous cobra.

Political thriller based on a story of coup against Bolsheviks by the Left Socialist Revolutionary Party in Moscow on 6–7 July 1918. They assassinate German ambassador in Moscow in hope of gaining public support and dragging the country into new war with Germany.

Pavel Pavlovich Goryaev is not that young of an actor. For many years he plays in the provincial theater in leading roles. The director of a play based on a play that was written for Goryaev takes the young actor for his role. Goryaev at first falls into despair, leaves the theater, turns to friends. After a while he digests what happened and realizes that it is time to leave the stage with dignity.

Four former soldiers reunite 25 years after the war. Last time they saw each other on the Byelorusian railway station in the summer of 1945. Now they've come together to mourn the death of a friend.

Follows the famous Oryol trotter, multiple champion of the beginning of the century. Then - in sharp battles on the tracks of hippodromes - the fate of domestic horse breeding was decided. The world of animals and people is shown through the perception of a horse named Big Boy.

As an adviser to the emperor Nicholas II, mystic Grigori Rasputin holds great influence over the empire. However, many in St Petersburg begin to regard Rasputin, with his strange practices and mesmerizing qualities, as a liability and plot his assassination. When Rasputin, known to many as the 'Mad Monk', leads Nicholas to embrace an ill-conceived military strategy, a group of determined conspirators set down a plan to eliminate him.

In November, 1942, near the Volga, Stanlingrad is under siege of Commander Friederich Paulus and his 330,000 men. The Russian high command unleashes an operation to protect the Mishkova River to avoid that about four hundred tanks join Paulus' army. The Soviet artillery soldiers protect their position with their lives in a bloodshed with few survivors.

In the Soviet airbase, occupied by the Nazis, a resistance group occurs, led by a modest girl Anna Morozova. For each victory (important, albeit small on a scale of the war) they have to pay a heavy price.

The Master is a talented writer in Moscow working on a manuscript about Jesus and Pontius Pilate. The Moscow authorities are harassing Master by surveillance and intimidation. His assistant and muse, Margarita, tries to help the Master through the supernatural powers she got from the devil, Woland, who is visiting Moscow.

It is the future, the world is in ruins and a large portion of the population consists of deformed mutants living in reservations. In this world a man decides to spend his vacation visiting the ruins of a museum that is now buried under the sea.

Pavel Ivanovich Chichikov plans to buy the titles to “dead souls” and use them as collateral to obtain a large loan. He comes to a small provincial town and begins to proposition the local landowners. These landowners are revealed to be so petty and avaricious that not even Chichikov’s amazing offer can be worked to his advantage on them. Some stall, some refuse for no obvious reasons, some promise and then renege, and others want “in on the deal.” In the end, Chichikov, having concluded that the landowners are a hopeless lot, leaves for other regions.