The Image of the Ascetic Hero in the Cinema of the Thaw

Abstract

At the height of the Thaw, the mythology of asceticism flourished, taking extreme forms of martyrdom and passion-bearing, bordering on fanaticism. The on-screen fairy-tale of the “Grand Manner” cinema became a reality: directors showed the devotees with the degree of authenticity that they would not dare to demonstrate in the 30s and 40s. The radical, and sometimes even shocking, characterization of the heroes of revolution (“Pavel Korchagin”, “The Forty-First”) caused a furious controversy about the relevance of such naturalism.
The convergence between the images of the ascetic heroes and the lives of religious martyrs and ascetics became apparent. Heightened drama, life and struggle beyond human capacity, the rejection of personal happiness for the sake of the public good, sacrifice - those are the main features of the characters of “Pavel Korchagin”, “The First Teacher”, “The Forty-First”, “The Communist”, etc.
The main stumbling block was the phenomenon of female asceticism (“The Forty-First”, “Commissar”). The revolutionary idea came into conflict with the essence of the human nature and the nature rule. The resigned sacrifice of Maryutka and Commissar Vavilova made the audience shudder. Their wild acts unnatural for women (like sacrificing the loved one and the child) reflected the twisted fate of the whole country. The idea of the victory of mind over matter was discredited, and the myth was literally blown up from within.
The cinema of the Thaw showed a gradual emancipation of the pupil from the mentor, essentially destroying the mythological triad. And the heated debate on excessive radicalism and naturalism in the depiction of the hero and the unnaturalness of female asceticism was the evidence of a more precarious position of the mythologeme. The fate of new fanatical heroes was treated not merely as the only form of existence in the mythologized Soviet space, but also as human tragedy. Or was it a mistake? The question mark still remains.