Alone

Alone (, meaning "Alone") is a Soviet film released in 1931. It was written and directed by Grigori Kozintsev and Leonid Trauberg. It was originally planned as a silent film, but it was eventually released with a soundtrack comprising sound effects, some dialogue (recorded after the filming) and a full orchestral score by Dmitri Shostakovich. The film, about a young teacher sent to work in Siberia, is in a realist mode and addresses three political topics then current: education, technology, and the elimination of the kulaks. Plot The film tells the story of a newly graduated Leningrad teacher, Yelena Kuzmina. She goes furniture shopping with her fiance, Petya, and in a fantasy sequence she imagines teaching a class of neat, obedient city schoolchildren. Instead, she is assigned to work in the Altai mountains of Siberia. Reluctant to leave, she appeals to remain in the city. Although her request is granted (by a faceless Nadezhda Krupskaya, seen only from behind), she is eventually spurred by the government's condemnation of 'cowards' such as her to accept the post. Yelena arrives in a remote village, where the two authority figures are the feckless representative of the Soviet and the Bey — the local version of the kulak. The villagers live a primitive life, practicing shamanist religion (symbolised by the totem of a dead horse on a pole) and living entirely off their herd of sheep. The children become devoted to Yelena, but their education is hampered both by their primitive condition and by the insistence of the Bey that they work as shepherds rather than attending school. The representative of the Soviet refuses to help Yelena against the Bey; although he has received posters calling on people to expel the kulaks from the collective farms, his only comment is that the posters "look pretty". Undaunted, Yelena takes her lessons to the children working with the sheep. The Bey, however, has illegally sold the sheep to some sheep traders, who begin to slaughter the animals. Yelena declares that she will travel to the regional centre to find out about Soviet regulations concerning dealings in sheep, but on the way she is thrown off a sled by one of the sheep traders and becomes lost in a snowstorm.