Religious Topics in the Soviet War Film on the Second War (1945-91)

Abstract

The aim of promoting an analysis of the image of Christianity and its changes over decades in the Soviet scene can be achieved through its cinema. Soviet films about the Great Patriotic War produced between 1945 and 1991 indicate changes in social sentiments and positions sanctioned by the regime as the presence and performance of religion and religious men during the conflict are reworked in the face of contemporary circumstances. War film is perhaps the main cinematographic genre for the diffusion of ideological messages - for example, the defense of warmongering or pacifism. Despite the interest of the State in releasing its version of military history, it is always possible that the film provides ambiguous or contrary interpretations. In the war movies about World War II, themes that are adverse to official rhetoric (such as religion) and an even less consensual treatment emerges, such as a positive view of spirituality or the religious institution. More than an isolated dissidence of a director against the Kremlin, it is a phenomenon with roots in the society, reaching even the party. Marc Ferro's social history of cinema is employed, with the analysis starting from the context then on to the film, in search of the latent messages of its own time.