Cinema of Kazakhstan
Template:Infobox cinema market Template:Culture of Kazakhstan Cinema of Kazakhstan refers to the film industry based in Kazakhstan. Cinema in Kazakhstan can be traced back to the early 20th century. Today, Kazakhstan produces approximately fifteen full-length films each year.<ref name="Kazakhstan">Template:Cite web</ref>
Contents
History
1930s-1980s: the Soviet period
The film industry in Kazakhstan has its origins in the production of documentaries in Alma-Ata (now Almaty) in the 1930s, developed to use as instruments for Soviet propaganda.<ref name="History of Cinema of Kazakhstan">Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> The first Kazakh feature film, Amangeldy (1939), about the leader of the 1916 revolution, Amangeldy Imanov, was however the work of Lenfilm in Leningrad.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Filmmaking in Kazakhstan was given a boost by the dislocations caused by World War II, as the main Soviet film studios, Mosfilm and Lenfilm, were both evacuated to Alma-Ata, where they combined with the Alma-Ata Film Studios to produce the Central United Film Studio.<ref name="History of Cinema of Kazakhstan"/> As a result, the Central United Film Studio, which continued working in Alma-Ata till 1944, produced 80 percent of all Soviet domestic feature films made during the war.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Much of the great Soviet director Sergei Eisenstein's two part epic Ivan the Terrible was filmed in the Kazakh SSR.<ref>Perrie, Maureen. The Cult of Ivan the Terrible in Stalin's Russia (Studies in Russian and Eastern European History and Society) . New York: Palgrave, 2001 (hardcopy, ISBN 0-333-65684-9).</ref> One of the major Soviet film schools, the Gerasimov Institute of Cinematography (VGIK), was also temporarily relocated to Alma-Ata during the war.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> This film school became an alma-mater for the most notable Kazakh filmmakers of the 1960s, known as "the new wave".<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> On January 6, 1961, the major Kazakh film company Alma-Ata Film Studios had its name changed to Kazakhfilm by the Ministry of the Culture of the Kazakh SSR.<ref name="History of the Kazakhfilm">Template:Cite web</ref>
In the post-war Soviet period, the major figure of Kazakh SSR's film industry was director Shaken Aimanov, in whose honor the Kazakhfilm film studios were renamed in 1984.<ref name="History of the Kazakhfilm"/> Notable films of this period include a number of historical epics, such as the love tragic story Kyz-Zhibek (1970),<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> and a trio of action films involving a secret agent, played by Asanali Ashimov, who uses all manner of derring-do to defeat the enemies of communism. The first in the trilogy, The End of the Ataman (1970), was set in 1921 and was directed by Shaken Aimanov.<ref name="The End of the Ataman">Template:Cite web</ref> The second, The Trans-Siberian Express (1977),<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> directed by Yeldar Orazbayev and set in 1927, featured a complicated plot involving the defeat of counter-revolutionaries planning to kill a Japanese businessman on a train bound for Moscow, on which our hero was masquerading as a cabaret manager. The third, The Manchurian Variant (1989), was set in 1945 Manchuria.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> The films, with their central hero played by a Kazakh actor, were, as well as entertainment, part of the efforts of the Soviet establishment to demonstrate that the Kazakh people fully supported communism.<ref name="The End of the Ataman"/>
Late 1980s-early 1990s: Kazakh New Wave
Template:Expand section With perestroika in the Soviet Union of the 1980s emerged a new wave of young Kazakh filmmakers, ready to challenge the cinematic establishment. A catalyst for this new movement in Kazakh film was provided by The Needle (Игла;1988), the first film directed by Rashid Nugmanov, who cast as his central figure Viktor Tsoi, front-men of the rock group Kino and also hero to disaffected Soviet youth.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Kino also contributed a soundtrack. Tsoi's character returns to Alma-Ata to collect money he is owed, only to find out that his former girlfriend has become a drug addict. He decides to fight against the drug pushers and it all ends badly.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Another important founding work of the movement is Ermek Shinarbaev's 1989 film Revenge (Месть), which tackles on film for the first time the tragedies experienced by the Korean population in Kazakhstan and Central Asia.
1990s-2000s: the post-independence Kazakhstan
In 1993, Nugmanov directed The Wild East, loosily based on Akira Kurosawa's Seven Samurai, involves a group of dwarves, runaways from the circus, who brings the magnificent seven to protects them from the predations of motorbike-riding Mongolian hoodlums.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Nugmanov moved to Paris in 1993, where he has been associated with Kazakh political opposition groups.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Other filmmakers of the post-independence Kazakhstan to have achieved success at international festivals include Satybaldy Narimbetov.<ref name="Satybaldy Narimbetov">Template:Cite web</ref> His Biography of a Young Accordion Player (1994) is a tale of a small boy growing up in a Kazakh village during World War II.<ref name="Satybaldy Narimbetov"/> Leila's Prayer (2002) focuses on girl from a village close to the Semipalatinsk nuclear test site, whose mother prayer is that her baby son should live to old age.<ref name="Kazakh Cinema Between 1998 and 2003">Template:Cite web</ref> Darezhan Omirbaev's Killer (1998), a Kazakh-French co-production, is a tragic tale highlighting the economic difficulties by Kazakhstanis in the 1990s.<ref name="Kazakh Cinema Between 1998 and 2003"/><ref name="Killer (1998)">Template:Cite web</ref> A young driver from Almaty causes a minor motor accident when taking his wife and newborn baby back home from the hospital. Unable to pay for the damage, he gets sucked into crime.<ref name="Killer (1998)"/> Amir Karakulov has garnered critical praise for a number of films, including Homewrecker (1991), a tale of two brothers in love with the same girl.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Again, it all ends badly. A new arrival on the scene is Rustem Abdrashev. His directorial debut was Renaissance Island (2004), a tale of the first love of an aspiring poet set against the historical backdrop of the desiccation of the Aral Sea.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
One problem is that very few of these films have been widely seen by audiences in Kazakhstan. Domestic distributors have preferred to rely a diet of dubbed Hollywood blockbusters and big-budget Russian movies, with the result that post-independence Kazakh cinema has developed something of a reputation a being more likely to be found in Western art houses and international competitions than on screens in Kazakhstan. However, the big-budget Kazakhstan film has arrived. Nomad: The Warriors (2005), with its international crew and cast, was an officially supported attempt to bring a film based on an exploits of Kazakh warriors of the 18th century onto international screens.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Racketeer (2007), directed by Akan Satayev, about as a young Almaty in the tough economic climate of the 1990s, was billed as the first purely commercially oriented film made in the post-independence Kazakhstan, and proved a considerable box-office draw.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> One Kazakh director, Timur Bekmambetov, has also had success internationally in commercials cinema projects, particularly with the Russian fantasy features Night Watch (2004) and Day Watch (2006).<ref name="Bekmambetov Is Off To See The Warriors, The Wonderful ‘Warriors Of Oz’">Template:Cite web</ref> Bekmambetov is now directing and producing movies in Hollywood.<ref name="Bekmambetov Is Off To See The Warriors, The Wonderful ‘Warriors Of Oz’"/> His notable works made in Hollywood includes Wanted (2008), The Darkest Hour (2011) and Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (2012).
Cinemas
Cinemas in Kazakhstan range from draughty Soviet survivals to modern multiplex complexes. The market of cinemas is mainly divided between the KinoPark Multiplex Cinemas, StarCinema, Arman and smaller players.<ref name="Film Industry">Template:Cite web</ref> Kazakhstan's new cinemas are usually located in shopping malls and entertainment centers.<ref name="Film Industry"/> Ticket prices are lower than those in Western Europe and North America. In 2012, IMAX Corp. opened those two cinemas in Kazakhstan, as the result of the deal signed with KinoPark Multiplex Cinemas in 2010.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Films originally made in English are almost invariably dubbed, not subtitled, but there is a little shown in English.
