Cinema
Heat
Зной
Larisa Shepitko · 1963
Synopsis
Kemel, seventeen, just out of school, leaves with a Komsomol assignment for the virgin lands of the steppe, where a brigade is clearing the soil under crushing heat. There he clashes with Abakir, a brutal tractor driver admired for his work, who demands unquestioning obedience from everyone; around a spring called the camel's eye, the boy tries to assert another way of living and working.
Context
The shooting took place in Kirghizia as a graduation project of the Moscow film school, from Chingiz Aitmatov's The Camel's Eye, whose Frunze studios adapted several of his texts in those years; the screenplay is by Iosif Olshansky. It is credited with the first international recognition of young Kyrgyz fiction cinema.
Who it is for
It helps to know that this film is a school project, and that most of what is said about it concerns the careers of those who made their debut in it rather than the film itself.
Prizes and reception
Prize for direction at the All-Union festival and a distinction at Karlovy Vary in 1964; it brought the young Kyrgyz cinema its first international recognition.