Hard to be A God: the movie...

Hard to be a God was intended to be a swash-buckling adventure when the brothers Strugatsky first considered writing the novel. Unfortunately, they lived in Soviet Russia and one of the sporadic aesthetic interventions by the state (basically, there was some official ranting about fiction being a medium for communist ideas). Luckily, Arkady and Boris knew how to play the system. Hard to be a God manages to be compassionate and exciting, even as it explores ideas of Marxist historical dialectic.

Besides, it is both futuristic and historical: observers from a future communist Utopia have discovered an earth-like world and have been sent to watch its development from feudalism, through capitalism, to communism. Being good anthropologists, the observers immerse themselves in the society: being from an advanced society themselves, they get to kick ass.

Anyway, there's a film, and what's not to love? It's Russian, in black and white, it explores Marxism, it has plenty of grubby medieval action and Errol Flynn style shenanigans. And it is coming to the GFT.






Hard to Be a God is a Russian science fiction film directed by Aleksey German. Based on the novel "Hard to Be a God" by Arkady and Boris Strugatsky.