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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The Big Grief of a Little Woman

The Big Grief of a Little Woman

As it Happens Sometimes
1929, First Film Studio VUFKU (Odesa), 6 parts / 1,548 m

Director:
 Mark Tereshchenko
Scriptwriter:
 Vasyl Kosach (Radysh)
Cameraman:
 Borys Zaveliev
Artist:
 Volodymyr Miuller
Cast:
 Zoia Valevska (Halia Oskylko), I. Sudbinin (Serhii, her husband), S. Shymanskyi (Ivasyk, their son), Hanna Borysohlibska (Halia’s mother), Anton Klymenko (Pavlo Kovalchuk), A. Obukhovych (Kovalchuk’s sister), Oksana Podlesnaya / Pidlisna (Nina, Serhii’s second wife), Ivan Zamychkovskyi (a watchman), Volodymyr Lisovskyi, Heorhii Astafiev (Serhii’s friend), R. Rami-Shor (a flower seller), Mykhailo Shor (a passerby

 

Halia Oskylko loses her husband during the turmoil of the civil war. She is faithful to him for a long time. Meanwhile, Pavlo Kovalchuk, her friend’s brother, is attracted to her. Halia kind of returns his feeling but she hopes to find her lost husband, that is why she refrains from a relationship with him. Suddenly, she finds out that her husband is alive and works in Kharkiv. 

Halia goes there but the visit ends in a tragedy. Serhii lives with another woman, and they are married. If not for Kovalchuk, Halia would have died in a tram accident. The meeting with Halia revives feelings in her ex-husband. He wants to divorce Nina, his second wife, and return to Halia. But it is too late, as Halia marries Kovalchuk.

The film is lost.

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