VUFKU (All-Ukrainian Photo Cinema Administration) existed for less than nine years (1922-1930), but it managed to release over 140 fiction films, several hundreds of non-fiction films and newsreels, dozens of animations, gain fame of “Ukrainian Hollywood,” and take under its control all aspects of the cinematic process – filmmaking, distribution, film press, propaganda, and education. From over 140 full-length fiction films made by VUFKU, about 60 films are considered lost. A lot of the surviving films have come down to us incomplete (without one or more parts).

The website VUFKU. Lost&Found is the first online collection of Dovzhenko-Centre’s media library and is perhaps the only online resource providing comprehensive information on VUFKU.

The mission of the VUFKU. Lost&Found project is to search and return to Ukraine the lost films of the 1920s. Traces of some of the lost films of that time can be found in international archives. Meanwhile, we are collecting archive materials about the lost films, restoring their contents, learning the context of their release.

These searches and analysis, restoration of films and their return to the cultural circulation require financial support. Donating to our fundraising campaign, which will start in October 2019, you will be able to contribute to the restoration of Ukrainian cinema.

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Mud

Mud

Conspirator Against the State

1926, Second Film Studio VUFKU (Yalta), 7 parts / 2,765 m

Director:
 Heorhii Tasin
Scriptwriter:
 Mykola Liadov
Cameraman:
 Mykhailo Belskyi
Artist:
 Solomon Zarytskyi
Cast:
 Nikolay Panov (von Jagdt, a state counsellor), N. Tairova (Mariia Pavlivna, his wife), N. (M.?) Fedorenko (their son Serhii, a student-revolutionary), O. Olehov (Petro, their younger son), Ksana Zapadna (Musia, their daughter, a student), B. Honcharov (Bunchuk-Burunskyi, a landlord), Volkova (Netti, his daughter), H. Zosimov (Kallistov, a student-tutor), A. Ahramova (his mother), I. Bir (a student, Petro’s friend), Kh. Bohdanov (a hunter), Karl Tomskyi (Vaska Nosyk), Varvara Masliuchenko (Liulka, a prostitute)

The film is based on N. Mizgir’s novel of the same name. 

A noble tsarist civil servant von Jagdt has two sons. One day, police finds out about a secret meeting of revolutionaries, and his son Serhii is one of them. Chased by the police, Serhii seeks shelter at his father’s place, but von Jagdt, a man of principle, turns him in to the police. Serhii is exiled. Meanwhile, von Jagdt’s younger son Petro is going to get married to a rich girl. After the engagement, Petro and his friends go to a brothel, where Serhii, a fugitive from a penal colony, is hiding in the next room. Petro is happy to see his brother and takes him home. However, not all family members are glad to meet him, and the father threatens to turn his son in to the police again. Serhii who has pulmonary tuberculosis is then moved to another place where he dies soon. In the last minutes of his life, Serhii is supported only by a criminal Vaska and a prostitute Liuska, who are the only people showing concern and mercy… 

The film is stored at the Russian Gosfilmofond.

The film was released on 07 December 1927 in Kyiv and on 06 March 1928 in Moscow.