Togliatti(Grad)
Director Federico Schiavi
Countries Italy
Duration 100 min
Synopsis
The building of the Russian Togliatti and the huge “Vaz” plants, constructed from 1967 to 1973 in Samara region as a result of an agreement between USSR, Italy and Fiat. The factory and the city founded around it were build in 35 weeks, thanks to the work of Russian and Italian, coming mainly from Turin, working in hard climatic conditions and far from home. Through the direct experiences of the protagonists, and through a formidable historical footage, the documentary will tell this special experience. , The direct testimonies describe every aspect of life of that unusual community: the marriages between Italians and Russians, the failed romantic relationships, the parties held on Saturday at the gym of ziguly hotel, the transformation of it in a secret church every Sunday. Also it’s the testimony of some personal disillusions about socialism. The protagonists are indeed careful narrators of the rhythms and dynamics of work, the cases of depression and alcoholism, the difficult adaptation to the climate and the necessity to solve and overcome problems. Many home movies and some Russian archive images tell these moments., “Togliatti(grad)” wants to evoke the difficult and fascinating saga of the birth of a city in the heart of the Soviet empire, but also the experimental creation of a group of workers related to this story because of ideological, professional or sentimental reasons., In Togliatti, in a few years, cinemas, theaters, public parks were created, and also an embryonic market economy started attracting the attention of the international community and the intellectual world, the writer and chemist Primo Levi went there and found inspiration for his literary work, and even the actor Alberto Sordi, popular in the USSR, decided to shoot with Cesare Zavattini a film in Togliatti. The construction of the plant was finished in 1974 generating much criticism, both east and west of the Iron Curtain, for the unusual organizational and management model, too socialist for some and too capitalist for others. The plants are still working even after the crisis caused by the dissolution of the Soviet empire, and recently some brands, including GM and Renault, have signed partnership agreements with the company which took over the plant to renovate the production, Togliatti is still one of the main producer of cars in the world. , The town was for many years the youngest town in the world (26 years, average age), a genuine international unprecedented laboratory-community that was able to self-organize between two ideologies and two powerful propaganda machines, so even after 40 years this story is alive.
The building of the Russian Togliatti and the huge “Vaz” plants, constructed from 1967 to 1973 in Samara region as a result of an agreement between USSR, Italy and Fiat. The factory and the city founded around it were build in 35 weeks, thanks to the work of Russian and Italian, coming mainly from Turin, working in hard climatic conditions and far from home. Through the direct experiences of the protagonists, and through a formidable historical footage, the documentary will tell this special experience. , The direct testimonies describe every aspect of life of that unusual community: the marriages between Italians and Russians, the failed romantic relationships, the parties held on Saturday at the gym of ziguly hotel, the transformation of it in a secret church every Sunday. Also it’s the testimony of some personal disillusions about socialism. The protagonists are indeed careful narrators of the rhythms and dynamics of work, the cases of depression and alcoholism, the difficult adaptation to the climate and the necessity to solve and overcome problems. Many home movies and some Russian archive images tell these moments., “Togliatti(grad)” wants to evoke the difficult and fascinating saga of the birth of a city in the heart of the Soviet empire, but also the experimental creation of a group of workers related to this story because of ideological, professional or sentimental reasons., In Togliatti, in a few years, cinemas, theaters, public parks were created, and also an embryonic market economy started attracting the attention of the international community and the intellectual world, the writer and chemist Primo Levi went there and found inspiration for his literary work, and even the actor Alberto Sordi, popular in the USSR, decided to shoot with Cesare Zavattini a film in Togliatti. The construction of the plant was finished in 1974 generating much criticism, both east and west of the Iron Curtain, for the unusual organizational and management model, too socialist for some and too capitalist for others. The plants are still working even after the crisis caused by the dissolution of the Soviet empire, and recently some brands, including GM and Renault, have signed partnership agreements with the company which took over the plant to renovate the production, Togliatti is still one of the main producer of cars in the world. , The town was for many years the youngest town in the world (26 years, average age), a genuine international unprecedented laboratory-community that was able to self-organize between two ideologies and two powerful propaganda machines, so even after 40 years this story is alive.