User Reviews

Deaf Crocodile Films, in association with distribution partner Seagull Films and with restoration from the original camera negative by Mosfilm Studio, has created a new restoration of famed Russian fantasy filmmaker Aleksandr Ptushko's Skazka O Tsare Saltane.

Adapted from the Alexander Pushkin fairy tale, this movie is beyond gorgeous.

Driven from the Russian court by her evil sisters while Tsar Saltan (Vladimir Andreyev) is at war with cannibal trolls, Tsarina (Larisa Golubkina) and her infant son Prince Gvidon are tossed in a cask and launched into stormy seas. Somehow, her son (Oleg Vidov) has grown to adulthood and helps them to make it to an island where he falls in love with a human swan - a wereswan? - princess (Kseniya Ryabinkina) while dreaming of seeing his father again. So he asks the swan to transform him into an insect so he may spy on the evil sisters and learn how he and his mother can finally return to their home.

This is a movie filled with sheer magic, like a town trapped in time that must be rescued, monstrous sea giants, lion statues that come to life and a singing squirrel that is a puppet that will warm even the coldest of hearts. The fact that this movie is now coming out in the U. S. and can be streamed and purchased on blu ray is the kind of miracle that shows that we are truly in the golden age of physical media.

Deaf Crocodile has already released two other Ptushko films, Ilya Muromets (The Sword & the Dragon) and Sampo (The Day the Earth Froze). They've described his work as a combination of Walt Disney, Ray Harryhausen and Mario Bava, which sounds too fantastic but I can assure you is completely true. If you're wondering if you've heard of this creative force, he co-wrote Viy.

The Tale of Tsar Sultan was a lovely film, one of the loveliest I've seen in a while. It was a great story to begin with, no surprise as it's Pushkin, but to see it unfold on film is quite a different experience. The film looks stunning with wonderfully vivid colours, it is a truly wonderful feeling when you feel like you've literally stepped into a perfectly illustrated picture book. The costumes and sets are just magical, maintaining that fairy-tale feel from beginning to end. The special effects are not the very best(though there are far worse), but fit within the fairy-tale/fantasy atmosphere beautifully. The music is a feast for the ears, it's lushly orchestrated with rousing and whimsical rhythms and has the feel of part dramatic opera(there's even a song that wouldn't have been too out of place in Rimsky-Korsakov's Sadko) and part sweeping fantasy, as you'd gather I love that kind of music. The story personifies Pushkin, Russian fairy-tale and fantasy, and in a thrilling and beautiful way. There are times where it is serious(but not too much), but there is also tongue-in-cheek and whimsical poetry, very similar to Ruslan and Ludmilla. All the elements are there, a swan princess, the sight of giant knights rising from the sea, a squirrel cracking gold nuts, ugly sisters and a wicked mother/step-mother figure, and incorporated in a way that will delight kids and adults alike. The characters serve their purpose in the storytelling faultlessly and are convincingly acted. To conclude, a truly lovely film. 10/10 Bethany Cox

Wow. I've watched a dozen or so Soviet fairy tale movies, but this one beats most, if not all.

Of course it's old. 45 years, to be precise. But it has a magic that defies age. The adventures of the young tsarevich and his apparently teenage mother start when they are sealed into a barrel, to travel to a magic tsardom in the sea.

There he meets many wondrous things, including a humanoid swan, a squirrel producing gold and emeralds, 33 giant soldiers from the deep blue sea, the young tsar turning into a mosquito...

The story is very weird, but ends well in a grand family reunion - I suppose, they are reported to live happily ever after.

Thanks to SuperIllu for bringing this DVD to German news-stands today. A very very worthy experience. 9/10.