Remember kids, just because it's Communist propaganda, that doesn't mean it can't be fun!

Are you an experienced musical improviser? Would you like to work with silent film? We're working in partnership with More Music to develop a vibrant scene of improvising musicians primed to work with silent film with a view to involvement in #SilentsByTheSea at Morecambe Winter Gardens

PSA for folks near Oxford (the UK one...) or just anyone on the hunt for podcast recommendations.

Arielle Nissenblatt (sounds like 'this & that'), please could you give this an RT for your UK followers that might be interested?

Have you seen Philip Sotnychenko’s elusive debut LA PALISIADA (2023)? Two gunshots, separated by a quarter of a century, the film uncovers the hidden connections between the violence of the past and the present.

Last chance to see La Palisiada exclusively on Klassiki ✨🎞️

Check out my most recent video for the David, the host of the Cold War Channel🇨🇦 🇺🇦🌻 this time on Mongolia under communism up to the 1960s!

How did Mongolia Survive Between Stalin's USSR and Mao's China? - Cold War youtu.be/GuMhvYfkRcY?si… via YouTube

Coming to the end of my first week in my ‼️new job‼️ as a Staff Writer in the MUBI Editorial Team! I feel very lucky to be working alongside the wonderful Phuong Le Laura Staab and Matt Thrift every day and I’m very excited for all that’s to come 🫶

That's quite the self-own right there.

Sold my first books last night (!) and donated all proceeds to humanitarian aid to Ukraine. Which feels double-amazing! Thank you readers. 🙏🇺🇦

We did an episode on the film adaptation a while back...

The Pushkin House #shortlist for their 2024 Book Prize is out. And it's great - we've already published #longreads of three, can't wait to read the others. Start reading!
themoscowtimes.com/2024/04/11/pus…

Absolutely!

In 1956, the Soviet Union became the first country to honour Robert Burns with a commemorative stamp.

A thing we learnt from Kristin Roth-Ey's Moscow Prime Time:

When the Red Army captured Berlin in 1945, a whole load of film prints were taken back to the USSR as 'spoils of war' and shown in Soviet cinemas.

The most popular of these looted movies with Soviet audiences? Tarzan films!

The Anna Karenina Fix is great, so we're sure this will be too!

And it's finally here!! A whopper at 710 pages (letterbox enlarged accordingly!). Congratulations to my co-editor Muireann (we did it!), all our contributors, and Open Book Publishers! And remember, this beauty is free for you all to download here: openbookpublishers.com/books/10.11647… Enjoy!

Once again, big quant guys, I am begging you to take area studies and cultural studies seriously. We can all be friends.

Just another plug about my podcast discussion with Tim Coleman on Rashomon, in which I raise comparisons with Lawrence Durrell's masterful literatary tetralogy The Alexandria Quartet. Was Rashomon an influence on Durrell's Justine (1957)?

Best mail is unexpected book mail!

Excited for “Not Russian” by Mikhail Shevelev, a gripping, illuminating novel about recent Russian aggressions and the humans caught in the crossfire. It’s a taut, elegiac political thriller and a fierce swipe at Putin’s effort to make Russia…

Lovely sunny afternoon so I spent it inside a lovely dark cinema watching a film about facism. This one, by mark cousins and it's brilliant, go and see if you can dochouse.org/event/italian-…

Alverdi and the Caucasus. #ReisenInGeorgien