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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Ostap Bandura

Ostap Bandura

1924, First and Second Film Studio (Odesa, Yalta), 6 parts / 1,579-1,759 m

Director:
 Vladimir Gardin
Scriptwriter:
 Mykhailo Maiskyi
Cameraman:
 Yevgeniy Slavinskiy
Artist: 
Ivan Suvorov
Cast:
 Ivan Kapralov (Ostap Bandura, a coachman), Mariia Zankovetska (Ostap’s mother), Vasylenko (Ostap’s father), Vasiliy Kovrigin (Savko, Ostap’s grandfather), N. Zubova (Katrusia, Ostap’s grandmother), Olha Bystrytska (Mariika, a rural woman), Liana Iskritskaia (Yuliia Chapyha, lady of the manor), B. Chuievskyi (her father, the landlord), Nikolay Panov (general Korniahin, Yuliia’s husband), N. Ulikh (Yuliia’s father), Leo Nehri (a grandfather), Volodymyr Lisovskyi (a priest), Tobilieva (his wife), Dmitriy Erdman (Onysym, a worker), Dmytro Kapka (a rural man), Teodor Brainin (a rural man), Dmytro Fedorovskyi (a rural man)

The young general’s coachman Ostap Bandura finds out from his father that the landlord cruelly punished his grandmother. It stirs up hatred towards landlord in Ostap, and he wants to revenge. One day, near the river under an old oak Ostap sees the general’s daughter, Yuliia Korniahina, drowning.

The guy saves her and soon falls in love with her. However, she selects an old general Korniahin instead of him. Ostap kills her. He is imprisoned. Ostap gets acquainted with political prisoners and realises that peasants can be freed only due to a revolution. During the October Uprising, Ostap becomes a political activist. During the civil war, he heads a detachment of Ukrainian Red partisans, who fight the White unit of general Korniahin…

This is the last of eight (six of which were feature films, and two were propaganda films) films shot by Vladimir Gardin in Ukraine.

In the opinion of some researchers, the protagonist (his name and image) is based on I. Ilf’s and Ye. Petrov’s protagonist of the popular novels, “It is no coincidence that Ostap Bender pretends to be a hero-partisan of the civil war (like the film’s protagonist) and tells about his adventures in Myrhorod during one of funny breaks between Makhno and Tiutiunnyk, and then shows up at the First Black Sea Film Studio crying out ‘Golkonda!’ and brining the script of the people’s tragedy The Neck. Well, the great combinator was in a way born at this film studio.” (Novyny Kinoekranu, 1987. No 12).

The film was released on 05 September 1924. The film is lost.