In 1991, the Soviet Union collapsed… But it was the Soviet women filmmakers that would help forge the legacy it left behind.

Whether Sergei Eisenstein’s “Battleship Potemkin”, which revolutionized montage cutting and political filmmaking, or the more introspective and cerebral works of Andrei Tarkovsky, often times the women directors of the Soviet Union have been eclipsed by these cinema giants. But whether it’s 1924’s “Aleita: Queen Of Mars”, visualized by world-renowned soviet cinematographer Yuri Zhelyabuzhsky as one of the first science fiction film ever made (nearly 3 years before Metropolis), or The Brumberg Sisters’ “Samoyed Boy and The Lost Letter”, expressionistic animated films that paved the way for future female animators like Mary Ellen Bute and even Walt Disney, the Soviet Union’s cinematic landscape allowed women to be the trailblazers at a time when Hollywood studios seldom let females behind the lens at all. After nearly 70 years of building of the most vast and innovative cinematic canons in the world, free from the creative and narrative constraints of Western Hollywood hegemony, these women auteurs were free to explore the form without sacrificing themes or artistic choice in favor of commercialism.

Now, prepare to peel back the iron curtain in this brand-new 8 film collection The Soviet Women Of Cinema, and witness a filmography 7 decades in the making!