The Tale of the Fisherman and the Goldfish
About The Tale of the Fisherman and the Goldfish
A color cartoon of Pushkin’s 1833 tale opens on the learned cat from the prologue to Ruslan and Lyudmila, then settles on an old couple by the sea. The fisherman lets a talking goldfish go without a fee. His wife sends him back: a new washtub, a peasant hut, then the rank of a gentlewoman. The hut becomes a mansion; she has him dragged to the stables, and two weeks later he drives her troika until a guard stops them for the tsar. She demands to be tsarina, slaps him, and later, from a palace balcony, orders a fifth wish — to rule the sea, with the fish as her servant. He calls into a storm. The fish does not answer. He comes home to the old hut and the broken tub. The cat on the chain closes the reel.
Cast & crew
More about The Tale of the Fisherman and the Goldfish
Mikhail Tsekhanovsky directed, Mikhail Volpin wrote the script, and Yuri Levitin composed the score, conducted by Alexander Gauk. Tatyana Mavrina supplied design sketches; Pyotr Repkin and Dmitry Berezovsky were the art directors. Vera Tsekhanovskaya was assistant director. The studio premiered it on 16 January 1950.
Themes
Making
Tsekhanovsky had moved to Moscow after the war and was working at Soyuzmultfilm. The reel is hand-drawn and sung, built on Mavrina’s sketches and backgrounds drawn from Valentina Nechaeva’s studies.
Reviews
Georges Sadoul discusses the film in his history of cinema. The 1951 Karlovy Vary jury gave it the festival’s top animation prize.
Look
Mikhail Druyan shot the cel artwork. The sea is drawn in stages, from a light chop when the fisherman asks for a tub to a full storm on the last visit.
Music
Yuri Levitin wrote the score. Alexander Gauk conducted. The original voices are Chirkov, Zueva, Babanova, and narrator Gribkov; a 2001 redub replaced that track.
Preservation
Soyuzmultfilm’s original voices survive, and so does a 2001 restoration by Studio AS and Detsky Seans 1 that replaced the soundtrack and has been criticized for the new image as well as the dub.
Notes
- The titles run 31 minutes 54 seconds. Wikidata rounds the length to 32 minutes.
- Boris Chirkov speaks the fisherman, Anastasia Zueva the wife, Maria Babanova the fish, and Vladimir Gribkov reads the verse. Georgy Millyar is a boyar and Vladimir Gotovtsev a nobleman.
- Animators on the crew included Fyodor Khitruk, Roman Kachanov, and Roman Davydov.
- Mikhail Druyan was the cameraman, with assistants N. Sokolova and Ekaterina Rizo. Nikolai Prilutsky recorded the sound.
- In 2001 Studio AS and Detsky Seans 1 replaced the entire track. Yulian Balmusov, Zhanna Balashova, and Irina Malikova spoke the leads on that dub, which viewers and technicians disliked.
- The fish’s line when she grants the first wish is Pushkin’s “Don’t sorrow; go with God.”
Awards
- Grand Prize for best animated film, 6th Karlovy Vary International Film Festival (1951)
Scenes
- The wife dumps the new tub and orders a hut, then a title, after she sees a gentlewoman pass in a carriage.
- Servants haul the fisherman to the stables while she admires herself in a mirror and slaps the maid.
- A palace guard blocks the troika; the left rear wheel comes off as the tsar’s party goes by.
- He calls into the storm, the fish swims off without a word, and the wife is back at the broken tub.
Influenced by
- The Tale of the Fisherman and the Fish (Alexander Pushkin, 1833)
Also available
- Wikimedia Commons (1950. Сказка о рыбаке и рыбке.webm)
Quotes
Don't sorrow; go with God.
