Aelita, Queen of Mars

Dir. Yakov Protazanov. 1924, 111 mins. DCP. With Nikolai Tseretelli, Valentina Kuindzhi, Yuliya Solntseva. In this poetic, early Soviet science-fiction, a youthful man builds a spaceship to find the woman of his dreams and lead a socialist uprising against the Martian Elders. A masterpiece of mid-1920s production design and a precursor to the later UFA films of Fritz Lang and the Universal Flash Gordon serial, Aelita features costumes and sets conceived by the great Constructivist Aleksandra Ekster and originally played to music by Dimitri Shostakovich.