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GenreBiography, Drama, Romance Music directorIsaac Schwartz LanguageRussian
WriterVladimir Motyl, Oleg Osetinsky, Mark Zakharov Release dateNovember 11, 1975 (1975-11-11) Initial releaseNovember 10, 1975 (Soviet Union) CastOleg Strizhenov (Князь Волконский), Aleksey Batalov (Князь Трубецкой), Natalya Bondarchuk (Княгиня Волконская), Irina Kupchenko (Княгиня Трубецкая), Igor Kostolevskiy (Иван Анненков), Oleg Yankovskiy (Кондратий Рылеев) Similar moviesAleksey Batalov movies, Movies about Russia, Dramas
The Captivating Star of Happiness (Russian: Звезда пленительного счастья, Zvezda plenitelnogo schastya; lit. The Star of Fascinating Happiness) is a 1975 Soviet historical drama. The title is an allusion to a line from a poem by Alexander Pushkin. It is a costume drama dedicated "to the women of Russia".
The story is set in the aftermath of the Decembrist revolt against Tsar Nicholas I in 1825. The revolt is repressed, and the military officers involved confess one by one. They are sentenced to exile in Siberia and their wives face the decision as to whether or not to follow them.
Eva Shikulskaya - Polina Göbl-Annenkova, in marriage Praskovya Yegorovna
Igor Kostolevsky - Ivan Aleksandrovich Annenkov, Decembrist, cavalergard
Lev Ivanov - Nikolay Raevsky, a general from the cavalry (not in the credits)
Raisa Kurkina - Sofya Alekseevna Raevskaya, the wife of NN Raevsky
Tatyana Pankova - Anna Annenkova, the mother of IA Annenkov
Aleksandr Porokhovshchikov - Pavel Pestel
Victor Kostetskiy - Pyotr Kakhovsky
Yuri Rodionov - Sergey Muravyov-Apostol
Oleg Yankovsky - Kondraty Ryleyev
Tatyana Fedorova - Natalia Ryleeva, the wife of KF Ryleeva
Vasily Livanov - Emperor Nicholas I
Innokenty Smoktunovsky - Ivan Bogdanovich Zeidler, Irkutsk Governor
Vladislav Strzhelchik - Count Laval
Dmitry Shilko - Count Mikhail Miloradovich, St. Petersburg Governor-General
Igor Dmitriev - Count Lebzeltern, Austrian Envoy in St. Petersburg
Boris Dubensky - Emperor Alexander I
Victor Terekhov - Vasily Vasilyevich Levashov, Adjutant-General
Vadim Makarovsky - Vosh
Arkady Trusov - Fedor, valet Annenkov
Mikhail Kokshenov - Nikita, servant of Annenkov-senior
Alexei Kozhevnikov - Paphnutius, servant of Zeidler
Production
After making the 1970 hit film White Sun of the Desert, Motyl did not get directorial projects for five years.
When Motyl got the green light from Goskino to make a film about the Decembrists, he still had problems and had to do many rewrites because the authorities believed that the picture had too many parallels to the Soviet regime and allusions about Soviet dissidents.
Nevertheless, the screenplay was rejected. Then Motyl went to Leningrad, to the regional party committee. He handed the script to the secretary on ideology; the woman did not have time to read it and instead gave the text to her daughter who ended up adoring it. The mother called Filipp Ermash, Moscow's Minister of Cinematography and declared that "The Leningrad Regional Committee is interested in the film about the Decembrists!" Thus the script got to Lenfilm, but the budget was cut to 1.5 million rubles from the initial 3.5 million.
The locations of the film included the Peterhof Palace and the Winter Palace.
