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Abdulladzhan, or Dedicated to Steven Spielberg (1992)

Abdulladzhan, or Dedicated to Steven Spielberg (1992)

Science Fiction Comedy
Release Date: 1992, July 13
Directors: Zulfikar Musakov
Countries: Soviet Union
Production: Vatan
Cast: Sergey Dreyden, Vladimir Menshov, Gennadios Patsis, Yulduz Khamidova, Radzhab Adashev, Shukhrat Kayumov, Tuti Yusupova, Tuychi Aripov, Dzhavlon Khamrayev, Khodzhiakbar Nurmatov, Jamol Hoshimov, Galina Lukovnikova-Mamedova

Overview:

Considering that Musakov’s Abdulladzhan (1991) was dedicated to Steven Spielberg, we might suggest that these four boys embody nothing more complicated than a conflict of youthful innocence with some ominous threat—the basic workings of E.T. (1982) or War of the Worlds (2005), say. That threat, however, is best understood not through vague nationalism or warmed-over socialism, but through the other reference-point of Abdulladzhan—Tarkovskii’s Stalker (1980). Musakov leaves his boys in a simplified radiance so bright and so overexposed that it no longer looks like the skies of sunny Tashkent, but a disturbing, borderless luminosity to match the flat tonal range of Stalker’s “Zone.” Our Uzbek boys are nowhere in particular; this is a broader domain than anything international.