This rarely-screened gem, produced in Yugoslavia, is one of Andrzej Wajda’s more singular films. Adapting Nikolai Leskov’s nineteenth-century novella about adultery and murder, and incorporating Dmitry Shostakovich’s riveting opera on the same source material, Wajda concocts a Polish-Russian-Yugoslav blend of noir and western. Olivera Marković stars as Katerina Izmailova, an unhappily married woman whose attraction to a carefree swineherd (Ljuba Tadić) sets in motion a chain reaction of crime and punishment. An acidic chamber piece, Siberian Lady Macbeth marks a turning point in Wajda’s filmmaking between his breakout hits and the grand historical sweep of his mature career.

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The exquisite final feature from Sergei Parajanov, Ashik Kerib is an intoxicating homage to the folk legends of Azerbaijan. Based on the writings of Parajanov’s beloved Mikhail Lermontov, the film relates the adventures of the eponymous minstrel (Yuri Mgoyan), who is forced to wander the land with his lute in hand for 1,001 days and nights to earn the dowry needed to marry the daughter of a wealthy nobleman. Replete with Parajanov’s signature tableaux, surrealistic touches, and swooning romanticism, this is a transnational tribute to the past and present of the Caucasus that turns orientalism on its head.

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