Toth Database - Cinema
We Live
Plot
Returning to Petrograd from Crimea, where her bourgeois family had taken refuge at the outbreak of the revolution, the young Kira Argounova resumes her studies and faces the daily difficulties of the Russian reality of the early twenties, between the repercussions of forced statefulness and the use of the 'new economic policy'. He meets on the street a young man of aristocratic descent, Leo Kovalenski, guarded by the political police, and falls in love with him. Under arrest for suspected anti-Soviet activity, Kira is released by Commissioner Andrei Taganov, who is struck by her beauty and proud character. Leo, who is ill, needs to be admitted to the sanatorium, and to ensure his care Kira becomes Andrei's lover. When Leo, healed, returns, Kira goes to live with him. Out of work, Leo lets himself be lured into a round of illicit trafficking for which he is arrested by Andrei himself, who discovers Kira's true connection to Leo. Already appalled by the oppressive turn taken by the political regime in which he had identified his ideals, and now disappointed even in love, Andrei makes one last generous gesture; he frees Leo, then, before being shot for treason, kills himself. Leo recoils at Kira for being Andrei's lover and leaves her; The woman decides to flee Russia clandestinely, but at the border, on a snowy field, she is surprised by a guard who shoots and kills her.
Country of production: Italy
Year: 1942
Duration: 94 min
Color: B/N
Audio: Sound
Genre: Dramatic
Director: Goffredo Alessandrini
Subject: Ayn Rand
Screenplay: Corrado Alvaro, Anton Giulio Majano, Orio Vergani
Production company: Scalera Film, Era Film
Distribution: Scalera Film
Photograph: Giuseppe Caracciolo
Editing by Eraldo Da Roma
Music: Renzo Rossellini
Set design: Andrei Bessborodoff
Actors
Alida Valli
Giachetti Phosque
Rossano Brazzi
Emilio Cigoli
John Grasso, Jr.
Hannibal Betrone
Elvira Betrone
Sennuccio Benelli
Cesarina Gheraldi
Silvia Manto
Bianca Doria
Lamberto Picasso
Claudia Marti
Evelina Paoli