Underplayed Gems

The Night Before Christmas (1951)

The Night Before Christmas poster
Original title
Ночь перед Рождеством
Directed by
Valentina Brumberg, Zinaida Brumberg
Genre
comedy film, fantasy film, Christmas film
Country
Soviet Union
Runtime
50 min
Rating
6.6 of 10 from 20 voters
Elsewhere
IMDb
The 3D catalogue: film cases on wooden shelves, with the cat sitting at the counter next to its greeting.

The catalogue in 3D

The film shelves have a room of their own that you can walk around in. The cat behind the counter is the AI Catbot, and they pick real films from the same catalogue when you tell them what you feel like watching. Nothing is for sale, here or in there. Go in from here and this film is already out on the counter, with more like it waiting on the shelf next to it.

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How it feels

This is a Soviet animated adaptation of a Nikolai Gogol story. It follows a blacksmith and his love interest during a Christmas night filled with magical events. The film uses a rotoscoping technique to create its characters.

whimsicalfolkloricnostalgicslow-pacedromanticwintryclassicalfairy-tale-like

What happens

The Night Before Christmas (Russian: Ночь пе́ред Рождество́м, Noch pered Rozhdestvom) is a 1951 Russian animated feature film directed by the "grandmothers of the Russian animation", Brumberg sisters, and produced by the Soyuzmultfilm studio in Moscow. The film is based on Nikolai Gogol's 1832 story "The Night Before Christmas". The animation features heavy use of rotoscoping, known as "Éclair" in the Soviet Union, and is an example of the Socialist-Realist period in Russian animation. The film is in the public domain in Russia and is widely available on numerous Home video and DVD releases, mostly along with other films. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

More like this

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