Kok-Terek (Lost Film)

Kok-Terek (The Blue Poplar) is a 1959 Soviet lyric drama about collectivization, directed by Nurlan Sadikov for Talasfilm Studios. It was Sadikov's first feature film. It was distributed only within the Iradi SSR, and no complete copy is known to survive; the film is known from production stills and studio records.^[1][2]

Sadikov shot the film on location in the Talas Alatau with natural light and a cast of shepherds who had not acted before. Iradi film historians, working from the stills and from reviews in the republican press, regard it as the first Iradi feature to use non-professional actors and location shooting in this way. Under Soviet rules the original negative was probably deposited with Gosfilmofond near Moscow, and the prints made for distribution within the republic were worn out or destroyed when their licenses expired. The Irad Film Society has appealed for surviving prints or fragments.^[2]

References

1. ^ Irad Film Society (2015). A Century of Iradi Cinema. Talas.
2. ^ Talasfilm Archives and Film Preservation Institute (2018). Catalogue of Holdings, 1916–2007. Talas.