Original Music Composer
Growing up in a Ukrainian peasant family, knowing all hardships of serf life, young artist and poet Taras Shevchenko in the years of study clearly identifies the meaning of true art, which is to serve the interests of the people. The poems of Shevchenko are imbued with love for the common people. Fiery freedom-loving creativity of Taras Shevchenko is known throughout Russia. Nicholas I exiles the poet to the distant Caspian fort where he is to serve as an ordinary soldier and is banned from writing or drawing. In the poet's difficult days he has the support of Ukrainian soldier Skobelev, Polish revolutionary Sierakowski, captain Kosarev and the commandant of the fortress, Uskov. For the sake of his release Chernyshevsky and Dobrolyubov are hard at work. And so, the sick and aged Shevchenko is finally free. Together with Chernyshevsky and Dobrolyubov, he dreams of a bright future of the motherland, when the Russian and Ukrainian peoples throw off the chains of slavery.
Original Music Composer
After the critical lambasting of his masterpiece Earth, Dovzhenko returned with a more popular iteration of its main motifs. Much like Earth, Ivan concerns itself with the natural rhythms of country life, disrupted by the beat of looming industrialisation.
Compositor
About the uprising of Ukrainian peasants under the leadership of the national hero Karmelyuk against landowners and Polish gentry. In the 1830s, Young Count Piglovsky returns to his estate from Paris. The carriage in which he is riding is surrounded by rebellious peasants. Their attempt to hang the master is canceled almost at the last moment, because it is not the count in the carriage, but his lackey - Ustym Karmelyuk. Ustym really serves as a lackey in the count's house and at the same time leads a peasant uprising. The government sends the army. In a fierce fight, Karmelyuk is almost captured, but he is saved by one of the serfs.
