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RF Ministry of Culture Film Department
and "DAGO" Studio
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present
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"A Cat and a Half"
Sketches for a film based on literary works
and drawings of Joseph Brodsky
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Once upon a time there was a little boy.
And there was a city.
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The most beautiful city
on the face of the earth.
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With an enormous grey river hanging over
its deep bottom,
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just like the sky above the river itself.
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Along the river stood majestic palaces
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with wonderfully ornate facades.
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I always adhered to the idea that God
is time, or at least that His Spirit is.
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If the Spirit of God moved upon the face
of the water,
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the water is bound to reflect it.
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That's the reason of my weakness for
water - for its folds, creases and patterns,
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and, since I come from the north,
for its greyness.
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I simply think that water
is the image of time.
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And we, I think, are partly
synonymous with water.
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reflected in 1000s of square meters
of silver sparkles,
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the city seems to be constantly
photographed by the water,
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and the filmed footage, on a sunny day,
looks like an archive of those blinding scenes.
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So it doesn't make sense to me
to try to be consecutive here.
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Life never looked to me like a set of clearly
marked transitions; rather, it snowballs.
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Now look, here's a cat, right?
A cat!
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He doesn't give a damn whether
"Pamyat" society exists,
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or the propaganda department
of the Central Comittee.
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Also, he doesn't care about the
President of the United States.
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Am I any worse than the cat?
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Akhmatova's neighbours had a cat -
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a huge, red, exceptionally noisy tom.
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She would say: "You know, it is not just
a cat, it is a cat and a half."
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And sometimes she would say: "Doesn't it
seem to you that Joseph is very much like it?"
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By the way, I even dubbed several animated films.
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Whose part?
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Try to guess...
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a cat and a half
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JOSEPH BRO
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JOSEPH BRODSKY
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SKETCHES
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I remember one day - the day I had
to leave after a month in Venice.
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I had just had lunch in some small trattoria,
grilled fish a half a bottle of wine.
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And squinting at the sun I suddenly felt:
I am a cat. A cat that has just had fish.
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Had anyone adressed me at that moment,
I would have meowed.
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I was absolutely beastly happy.
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I must have been a cat in a past life.
And I would like to remain one in my next one.
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Hullo. Is that you, Kitty?
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What have I had for lunch?
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Turkey and rice, some fish and
strawberries and cream for dessert.
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In May, 1972 they suggested that
I should leave the country.
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They gave me only a few days to pack.
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They don't generally make such offers in
Russia, and if they do,
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it means just one thing:
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I think no one is delighted
being thrown out of his home.
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But however you leave it,
it is still your home.
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Masya, go on the balcony with Osya.
I'll take a photo to remember you by.
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And then, you can take one of us.
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Come on, Masya, shoot: taxi's waiting,
the cat's fretting.
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- Os'ka, stop scratching...
- Os'ka, be a good boy, keep still...
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This is one of my first photos.
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My father took it when we were
living as evacuees in Tcherepovets.
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I've never forgotted that I am the son
of a photographer
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and that my memory simply develops a film.
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In the same way that others mark their
child's growth in pencil marks on a door frame,
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every year on my birthday my father took me
out to our balcony and photographed me there.
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The background was usually this square -
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The Cathedral of the Lord's
Transfiguration of all the Guards
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I can still see - on the arm-chair's back -
my father's dark blue Navy tunic with
its golden epaulettes...
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...on the chair there is my mother's
kimono with its dragons.
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And "Una furtiva lagrima" in the air.
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My father brought those records
from Shanghai.
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Good luck. Write to us from
every town, son, you hear?
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Ok, ok.
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Will you stop taking pictures? Who do you
think I am? Another Tamara Makarova?
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It seems I've already told you
that I love water.
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I was crazy about the Navy since
my boyhood years.
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To this day, I think that the country
would do a hell of a lot better
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if it had for its national banner
the flag of the Russian Navy...
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...our glorious, incomparable beautiful
flag of St. Andrew.
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and not that two-headed
cowardly Imperial bird,
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or the halfway-Masonic hammer and sickle.
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"La Cumparsita" is the greatest piece of
music of our time, as far as I'm concerned.
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I've never learned to dance, but I could
listen to these twangs for hours...
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...and, when there was no one around,
move to its tempo.
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Welcome to Hawaii
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As for the navy,
I was a true child of my father...
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and at the age of fourteen applied for
admission to a submarine academy.
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I passed all the exams, but because of the
fifth paragraph - nationality - didn't get in...
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and my irrational love for navy overcoats
with their double rows of gold buttons
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like lamps over an alley at night,
remained unrequitted.
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And I once lived in a city
Where statues grew on the houses,
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And where through the streets,
With cries of "Corrupt! Corrupt!"
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Would run the local philosopher,
Shaking his beard,
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And the endless waterfront
made life short.
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I figure that free thought in the Soviet
Union, and liberation of mind in general,
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begins - at least for my generation -
with Tarzan.
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It was the first movie where we saw
natural life. And long hair.
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And that wonderful Tarzan's cry that
filled the air over every Russian town.
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We began to imitate Tarzan.
That's how it started...
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And I daresay that the four seasons of
Tarzan alone
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did more for de-Stalinization than all of
Khrushchyov's speeches at the 20th Congress.
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Come down before you
break your fool neck!
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Give it up!
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They will come and getcha!
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- Angel, we'd better go.
- I'm not afraid.
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But that's a 200 foot dive!
He can't make it and live.
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Boy, what nerve!
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We'd better take you home...
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When leaving Russia I took with me
only my typewriter.
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Customs at the airport disassembled it
down to the last screw.
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That was their way of saying "Farewell".
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In the 1950s, every city youth had his
own collection of so-called "bone music".
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What was it, you ask?
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A sheet of X-Ray film with a homemade
copy of some jazz piece on it.
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With our instinctive individualism and
intolerance for all group affiliation,
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we were more American
than the Americans themselves.
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I say this to you as someone who
first tasted Coca Cola at the age of 32.
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Stop, oh moment,
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You are not so lovely
As you are unrepeatable.
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Our Pestel Street, which was once
named Pantaleon,
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after the Saint Pantaleon Church
that stood beacon-like at its far end,
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would take you into the Summer Garden.
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Pushkin once lived on that
part of the street,
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and somewhere in a letter
to his wife he says:
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"The entire Summer Garden is my orchard.
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Every morning, I go there
in nightgown and slippers."
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- Would you like one?
- What is it?
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- A cigarette. That's my D'Anthes.
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- Thanks.
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- Your house was #11, right?
- No, wrong.
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Ours was #27, and was �ver at that end,
by the intersection with Liteyny Avenue.
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I imagine how you, my friends,
some 30 years from now,
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will stand under my balcony after visiting
my parents on account of my birthday,
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having tasted pickled smelt,
my mother's signature dish.
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I remember how my father brought
an amateur camera from China.
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Later, that camera vanished somewhere
together with its film,
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which contained the pictures my dad had
taken of us: me, my mother, ships...
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Perhaps, this film will turn up
somewhere one day... who knows?
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My father managed to photograph me
incessantly, even at breakfast.
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Sometimes, I didn't like it.
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To tell the truth,
I was a rather wilful child.
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Stretch down to your toes...
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Stretch!... Stretch!...
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That's enough.
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Early in the morning the little boy
would set off for school.
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If the boy had two or three
spare minutes,
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he would walk 20-30 steps
to the middle of the river.
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All this time, he would be thinking about
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what the fish were doing
under such heavy ice.
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"Leningrad is the cradle of the
Revolution." Write, write.
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Why aren't you writing, boy?
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Pay attention, children:
"The cradle of the Revolution"
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And now we shall see a remarkable film.
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It was, in fact, a plain coup d'etat,
and a bloodless one at that.
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The "real" battle on Palace Square,
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with bodies falling left and right
and projectiles criss-crossing the sky,
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happened much later:
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in that film by Sergei Eisenstein!
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The Red Guards didn't meet any resistance;
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they raped half of the female unit
guarding the palace...
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...and looted its chambers.
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00:19:06,450 --> 00:19:10,350
At that, one of them drowned
in the wine cellars.
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00:19:24,450 --> 00:19:27,000
In the puritanical atmosphere
of Stalin's Russia
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one could get turned on by the 100%
innocent Socialist Realist painting...
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called "Admission to the Komsomol".
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Boy at the first desk!
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Yes, yes, you!
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What are you thinking of?
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Why don't you listen to your teacher?
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Stand up and leave the classroom!
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I'll show you the right way, my friend!
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I haven't flown anywhere yet,
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but already imagine myself sitting
somewhere on the Hudson shore
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and thinking about you.
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It must be about noon where you are.
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My dear Cats, they say
you have frost there.
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I beg you, sleep by turns on my cot
to keep it warm.
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You, Kitty, must be cooking lunch just now,
Os'ka rubbing against your legs,
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and Big Cat has begun writing
the first letter to me.
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Liteyny Ave. House 24, Apt. 28
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00:24:30,800 --> 00:24:33,850
O, how I liked to wander about the town
during the white nights of summer.
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I knew some places where
magnificent views unfolded.
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Mmm... yeah.
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For goodbye - not a sound.
Grammophone behind the wall.
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This worldly separation
Hints at what's yet to come.
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For apart, not together,
Must our eyes slowly close
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Until death. And after,
We won't lie side by side.
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All our homes fall apart,
And the thread breaks.
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Of all that we were, and
That which we couldn't save -
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One stays silent, unwitting,
Because as the days pass,
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One remembers the pain
Ever more than the joy.
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For goodbye - not a sound.
Only the Aonides' song.
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So does death torment us
Even while we yet live.
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00:26:22,000 --> 00:26:23,100
screenwriters Yuriy Arabov,
Andrey Hrzhanovskiy
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00:26:23,200 --> 00:26:24,200
director
Andrey Hrzhanovskiy
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00:26:24,300 --> 00:26:25,300
director of photography
A. Feodorov
194
00:26:25,400 --> 00:26:26,400
camera G. Drynitskiy, M. Sudarikov
195
00:26:26,500 --> 00:26:27,500
production designers
A. Boym, N. Krivulya
196
00:26:27,600 --> 00:26:28,600
assistant director
O. Dorman
197
00:26:28,700 --> 00:26:30,700
animation N. Bogomolova, G. Zebrova,
Ye. Malashenkova, L. Mayatnikova,
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00:26:30,800 --> 00:26:32,300
O. Panikona, N. Fedosova,
T. Podgorskaya
199
00:26:32,400 --> 00:26:34,400
cast Sasha Ginzburg, R. Kurkina,
S. Yurskiy, V. Stonozhenko
200
00:26:34,500 --> 00:26:35,500
Kasya the Cat
201
00:26:35,600 --> 00:26:37,100
computer graphics
S. Andrianova, A. Yevseyeva
202
00:26:37,200 --> 00:26:38,700
assistant designers
V. Averin, Y. Ivanova
203
00:26:38,800 --> 00:26:40,300
editing
R. Nazirov, N. Stepantseva
204
00:26:40,400 --> 00:26:41,400
sound
S. Gutman
205
00:26:41,500 --> 00:26:43,000
producers
D. Yurkov, A. Hrzhanovskiy
206
00:26:43,100 --> 00:26:44,100
executive producer
S. Shvidkaya
207
00:26:44,200 --> 00:26:45,200
administrator
A. Seleznyov
208
00:26:45,300 --> 00:26:46,800
post-production managers
O. Kurenkova, A. Kryukov
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00:26:46,900 --> 00:26:48,400
music by J. S. Bach, A. Vivaldi,
G. Donizetti, S. Prokofyev, P. Tchaikovsky,
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00:26:48,500 --> 00:26:50,000
A. Schnittke, D. Shostakovich,
W.C. Hardy, J. Matos Rodriguez
211
00:26:50,100 --> 00:26:51,600
for help and archive materials
special thanks to Z. Tamashevskaya,
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00:26:51,700 --> 00:26:53,200
Ye. Korobova, V. Golyshev, Y. Gordin,
Ye. Kasatkina, M. Milchik,
213
00:26:53,300 --> 00:26:54,800
M. and S. Volkova, N. and Y. Ivanov,
E. Rein, V. Ufliand
214
00:26:54,900 --> 00:26:56,400
and to M. Azyzian, P. Vail, D. Borovskiy,
V. Gerasimov, N. Gutman, K and O. Kochubey
215
00:26:56,500 --> 00:26:57,900
L. Leonskaya, Kitya Medvedeva, M. Neiman,
Ye. Nikitin, T. Nikoskaya, M. Pekarskiy,
216
00:26:58,000 --> 00:26:59,500
V. Roshchim, Ye. Stafyeva, I. Tumanian,
I. Schnittke, S. Schulz
217
00:26:59,600 --> 00:27:01,100
Anna Akhmatova museum in St. Petersburg
and, personally, N. Popova
218
00:27:01,200 --> 00:27:02,700
The Hermitage State Museum and,
personally, M. Pyotrovskiy and V. Matveyev
219
00:27:02,800 --> 00:27:04,200
The Central Navy Museum of St. Petersburg
and, personally, M. Mushketov and E. Korchagin
220
00:27:04,300 --> 00:27:05,550
The Museum of Cinema
and, personally, N. Kleyman
221
00:27:05,650 --> 00:27:06,850
The St. Petersburg History State Museum
and, personally, E. Grishko
222
00:27:06,950 --> 00:27:08,150
Summer Gardens and Palace - Peter I Museum
and, personally, T. Kozlova
223
00:27:08,250 --> 00:27:09,450
The Administration of School N1311 in Moscow
and, personally, G. Lipman
224
00:27:09,550 --> 00:27:10,650
TV and Radio State Foundation
and, personally, A. Vystorobets
225
00:27:10,750 --> 00:27:11,750
"Shat" Drama workshop
"Anima-film" studio
226
00:27:11,850 --> 00:27:12,850
Soyuzmultfilm studio
M. Gorky studio
227
00:27:12,950 --> 00:27:13,950
The tenants of Brodsky's former
apartment in St. Petersburg
228
00:27:14,050 --> 00:27:15,050
Processed by Salamandra Ltd.
229
00:27:15,450 --> 00:27:17,350
The film is based on the literary works
and drawings of Iosif Brodsky
and the photos of Aleksandr Brodsky
230
00:27:17,850 --> 00:27:20,250
Sponsored by the
RF Ministry of Culture Film Department
231
00:27:21,150 --> 00:27:22,750
Special thanks to Alfa Bank
(c) DAGO 2002
232
00:27:22,850 --> 00:27:25,480
subtitles from SHAR Studio's Youtube
channel, improved by Niffiwan, 2023