Mirror
Зеркало (1975)
Production
Budget
$622 000
Revenue
$48 522
Director
Scenario
Composer
Producer
Erik Waisberg
Actors
Margarita Terekhova
Natalya / Maroussia - the Mother
Ignat Daniltsev
Ignat / Alexei - 12 Years Old
Larisa Tarkovskaya
Nadezha
Alla Demidova
Lisa
Anatoliy Solonitsyn
Forensic Doctor
Nikolay Grinko
Printery Director
Tamara Ogorodnikova
Nanny / Neighbour / Strange Woman at Tea Table
Yuriy Nazarov
Rifle Shooting Instructor
Short description
Mirror centres on Alexei, a man in his forties looking back over his life while his marriage to Natalya has come apart and his relationship with his son Ignat has suffered for it. His memories return again and again to his mother and to his own childhood, and these personal recollections are interwoven with documentary footage and events from Soviet and world history. Alexei's father was a poet who left the family, and the film moves between past and present without a single neat chronology, drawing on poems by Arseny Tarkovsky, the director's father. The result is as much a portrait of a country and an era as of one family.
Andrei Tarkovsky directed and co-wrote the screenplay with Aleksandr Misharin, with Erik Waisberg producing for Mosfilm. It was Tarkovsky's fourth feature, arriving between Solaris and Stalker. Margarita Terekhova plays both Natalya and the mother, Maroussia, while Ignat Daniltsev appears as the young Ignat and as Alexei at twelve; Larisa Tarkovskaya, Alla Demidova, Anatoliy Solonitsyn and Nikolay Grinko are among the credited cast of twenty-four. Made in the Soviet Union and released in March 1975, it runs 107 minutes.
Reception has been divided along clear lines. On TMDB it holds a strong 7.9 from over a thousand ratings, while the small IMDb sample of thirteen votes gives 6.6. A separate critics' rating stands considerably higher, at 9.2 from twenty-seven reviews, indicating that professional viewers have responded to the film far more warmly than the general audience.
What's left behind the scenes
- The screenplay was supported at the studio of Grigory Chukrai's experimental creative association, but the chairman of Goskino, A.V. Romanov, was categorically against it. The realization of the "White, White Day" screenplay proved impossible, and Tarkovsky had to turn to another topic: he began filming "Solaris."
- After filming was completed, during the editing stage, the screenwriter and director faced difficulties in choosing the sequence of the film's episodes. A total of 32 episodes were filmed. Tarkovsky proposed creating a "letterbox with 32 compartments" and placing a card with the title of each episode in each compartment: "Selling Earrings", "Printing House", "Hypnosis Session", "Spaniards", and so on. According to A. Misharin's recollections, rearranging the cards took more than 20 days—each variation of the sequence revealed episodes that did not fit into the imagery, were not connected to, or did not flow from other episodes. Ultimately, a solution was found after one of the episodes was moved to the prologue, after which the sequence of all the remaining episodes harmoniously "fell into place".
- While filming one of the last episodes of the film, Tarkovsky proposed a new title for the picture – "Mirror".
- F.T. Ermash twice promised to send the film 'Mirror' to the Cannes Film Festival, but never gave permission, and the film was also not entered into the Moscow Film Festival competition. At the same time, the film was sold to foreign distribution companies and shown in France, Italy, and other countries. In Italy, 'Mirror' was named the best foreign film of 1980.
- The film's premiere was held in a narrow circle, with D. Shostakovich, P. Kapitsa, V. Shklovsky, P. Nilin, Yu. Bondarev, and Ch. Aitmatov invited. Their feedback on the film was positive.
- During filming, new episodes were added, replacing the interview with the mother that had been removed from the script, and the mother's role, as played by M. Terekhova, was significantly expanded.
- In 1972, F.T. Yermash was appointed chairman of Goskino, the views of Soviet cinema officials became more liberal, and Tarkovsky received permission to film "White, White Day." Before starting work on the film, the director revisited the approach to the screenplay, in which the dialogue with his mother was supposed to be filmed with a hidden camera. Tarkovsky decided to rewrite the screenplay, as a result of which the dialogue in the form of a questionnaire with his mother, which preceded each episode, was removed. Moreover, when the film was launched into production, the screenplay was constantly changing, and each day the film crew did not know which scene would be filmed. The co-authors of the screenplay reworked the scene on the eve of filming and arrived on set with scraps of paper on which the new version of the episode was written.
- The film's screenplay was titled "White, White Day."
- According to Oleg Yankovsky, part of the film was shot in Tuchkovo.
- The idea for the film arose in 1967 after the completion of filming for "Andrei Rublev." According to the recollections of playwright A. Misharin, during a walk with Tarkovsky along the Izmailovo Ponds, the conversation turned to a screenplay that would reflect the current state of the country, the present day, the realities of our lives. The plot of the proposed film largely coincided with Tarkovsky's real life, in particular, details such as his father's departure from the family and the protagonist's difficult relationship with his parents were discussed.
- According to A. Misharin, the Chairman of Goskino, F.T. Ermash, after watching the film, paused for a long time and then said: 'We certainly have freedom of creativity! But not to this extent!' On the one hand, no corrections were made to the finished film; on the other hand, the Chairman of Goskino's reaction influenced the film's distribution – it was shown in only a few cinemas in Moscow.
- In Alexei's apartment, while he is talking on the phone with his mother, you can notice a poster for the film 'Andrei Rublev,' which was also directed by Andrei Tarkovsky.
- A. Misharin and A. Tarkovsky began writing the screenplay in early 1968 at the "Repino" cinematographers' sanatorium near Leningrad. The plot emerged from Tarkovsky's own memories, stories told by others, discussions of literary works, and so on. Initially, there were no written notes. Only after a large number of ideas and images had accumulated did Misharin and Tarkovsky begin to try to systematize everything they had discussed. 36 episodes were identified (later, taking into account the intended length of the film, their number was reduced to 28). After that, the screenplay began to be transcribed to paper – they would write two episodes daily, discuss them, and make corrections. The screenplay was completed in two weeks, 14 episodes were written by Misharin, and 14 by Tarkovsky. The screenplay had an unusual form: it was structured around a hypothetical dialogue with Tarkovsky’s mother in the form of a questionnaire – she answered questions about her life, and each of her answers was accompanied by a kind of cinematic commentary.
- Originally, there was no role for Anatoly Solonitsyn in the script; it was created specifically for him. (From the recollections of M. Terekhova).
- L. Feiginova was responsible for the film's editing. According to her, she insisted that the episode "I Can Speak", which was originally intended to be within the film, be moved to the prologue. In addition, Tarkovsky accepted her suggestion to read poetry against the backdrop of newsreel footage, thereby making the poetry "more authentic and accessible, and the newsreel—more poetic".
Auditions in India
Casting calls in USA
Castingi w Polsce
Кастинги в Україні
