Who'da thunk that posting a couple of Beck albums on our site would have caused such an uproar? I didn't know there were so many Scientologists on "house committee" that could rally the troops so quickly. I'm rather impressed. But sadly, we must change gears, put on our "elitist" crocheted caps and creep into the heart of Mother Russia.
Heart of Dog is one of those films where I understood sixty percent of the film, while the other forty percent flew right over the top of my Sexican head. It's not that I don't know how to read English subs- it's that I'm not a Russian. I'm an American who's lived in Disneyland his whole life, and it puts me at a disadvantage every time I watch Russian films. But I so love Russian films, and I loved Heart of a Dog. I just didn't understand it as well as I would have liked to have. In my humble opinion, Heart of a Dog is a "must-download" and an extremely hard find. Enjoy this great film.
By Clarke Fountain at allmovie:
This Soviet film tells the story of Preobrazhensky (Yevgeni Yevstigneyev), a surgeon, who is a professor of medicine in Moscow. After the Russian revolution is thoroughly in place, he is visited by the housing committee, who feels that he should share the spaciousness his "big" five-room apartment with several others. Meanwhile, in an experiment he implants a dog with the heart and brain of a tramp. The dog gradually transforms into a man (Vladimir Tolokonnikov), but still has some doggy attitudes: for instance, he chooses to call himself Sharikov. Since Sharik is a common Russian dog name, just as "Rex" might be in the West, it is clear where the man-dog's sympathies lie. Sharikov becomes associated with the local Party officialdom, and begins to terrorize the professor and his assistant, Dr. Bormental (Boris Plotnikov). After he becomes a member of the housing committee, he wangles a room in the professor's apartment. Also, after being appointed a member of a state committee to deal with stray animals, Sharikov refuses to allow dogs to be killed, only cats. The movie is based on the 1925 story by Mikhail Bulgakov, which was very hard to find in Russia up until the perestroika. After people began reading it for the first time, they were amazed to discover how daringly he had criticized the emerging Soviet system. This Russian made-for-TV movie is perhaps the most successful adaptation of the story; an Italian version was made in 1975.
Technical Information:
Title: Собачье сердце/Heart of a Dog
Year: 1988
Country: USSR
Director: Vladimir Bortko
Source: DVD5 Retail
DVD Format: PAL
Container: .iso + mds
Size: 4.36 GB
Length: 2:07:41
Programs used: DVD Decrypter, ImgBurn
Resolution: 720x576
Aspect Ratio: 4:3
Video: MPEG2 @ ~4200 kb/s
Frame Rate: 25 fps
Audio: Russian- Dolby AC3 Stereo @ 192 kb/s
Subtitles: English, Russian
Menu: Yes (English and Russian)
Video: Untouched
DVD Extras:
- Filmographies
- DVD-ROM Content: photo albums, Mikhail Bulgakov's biography and his script in Russian
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