Journey of Dmitri Shostakovich

Near the end of his life in the early 1970s, Dmitri Shostakovich made a bizarre first voyage to the United States as a guest on a luxury Soviet cruise liner. The nine days of the journey form the basis for the nine chapters of this visually innovative documentary. Combining personal fragments from the composer's recently-published journals and propaganda footage of the ship's onboard entertainment with jarring and unfamiliar archive materials serves to illustrate the dark passage of Russian history in the 20th century. The film's use of Soviet-era kitsch and agitprop alongside haunting and dreamlike imagery derives
from and complements Shostakovich's music, which itself is filled with moments of great lyricism and exaggerated sarcasm.

The partner of the screening is the international music film festival [Music on Film-Film on Music] (http://www.moffom.org/en/index.php).