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In Russia (1970s - 1998)
As a child and a teenager, I was keen on going to the cinema. There were not many Western films that one could see in the Soviet Union, and I tried not to miss them. The majority of what was chosen for showing was critical of capitalism. Still, these films were almost the only window to Western life, and at least there one could notice that material standards of ordinary people were much higher than what Soviet propaganda told us.
Note: The other few possibilities to learn about the West were foreign radio stations, but due to jamming it was usually hard to make out was said there. One could also buy foreign magazines (Anglia, America, Guten Tag), but only in major cities and only in the retail, by chance.
Foreign films were shown mainly in cinemas. I believe it was a way to restrict the audience and to generate cash for the government (television didn't pay for itself because it didn't show commercials, it was largely a propaganda tool).
I tried to see all American films shown in the small town near Moscow where I lived. I was very impressed by the advanced technology and the dynamic plot of Capricorn One, Hangar 18, The China Syndrome, The Stunt Man and the historical panorama of Spartacus, Cleopatra, The Vikings.
I also remember seeing a few French and Italian gangster films (especially with Jean-Paul Belmondo) and some Indian films (the latter were usually about kidnapped children and the main attraction of these films were songs and dances).
I think that these films, seen in my childhood and adolescence, have aroused in me a keen interest for the outside world and foreign languages.
Many years later, in 1997, when I began to earn a good salary, I bought a TV and two video players and started buying cassettes, mostly English-language classics in the original. Unfortunately, all of these cassettes were bootleg copies, though legally sold in Moscow's biggest bookstores for 4 - 6 dollars.
In Sweden (1999 - 2000)
During my stay in Sweden, I could see films on TV in original languages with Swedish subtitles (in Russia and Canada original sound is voiced other with translation).
In the house where I lived, the TV had only a few channels, which were free, and good films were rarely shown. Going to cinema in Sweden was too expensive for me. On video I saw Titanic (too long and unrealistic sometimes, but the end is marvellous), and Kids (ghastly realistic).
As for Russian films, there was only one on TV during all 1.5 years of my stay -- Utomlyonnye solntsem (Burned by the Sun).
After my return to Russia, I saw mostly European and Russian films in Moscow's cinemas and chose 1-2 films a week from the TV programme.
In Québec (2003 -)
I have four TV channels, which are free, but there's very little to watch there: once or twice a week there's a good film on Télé-Québec and that's about all. Films are interrupted by commercials.
As for films available in town for buying or renting, unfortunately, in Québec (the most "European" region of North America) the choice is quite limited: 90% is American (mostly trash), the rest are films made in France, Canada and Italy. Other countries are practically non-existant on the local cinema landscape. Evidently, this situation reflects the narrow-mindedness of Québec's audience and film distributors.
It's not only my opinion: "On ne trouve pratiquement pas de films de qualité (en format vidéo ) au Québec et nous devons la plupart du temps les faire venir de l'étranger" (Yves Laberge. Cinema. Filmographie, Cinemateque de l'Université Laval).
Another drawback is that here all TV sets, DVD and video players are only for NTSC (North American video standard). Multisystem hardware is either not sold, or outrageously high priced (recently I found some exceptions, in particular CyberHome DVD-300). Furthermore, in the USA and Canada wide-screen films are often cut to fit TV screens.
In short, the market is too monopolised by American distibutors, who promote flics fit for morons and think only of their profits. Fortunately, I do not need their products, because I know where to find good films.
I see films mainly on DVD. I borrow them from Université Laval (for free) and from the network of local libraries (USD 1 per film), rent online (see below), sometimes buy and exchange them.
Due to this multitude of opportunities, now I watch more films than ever before, and I watch films, in the original, which were practically impossible to find in Russia.
Nowadays I see mostly European and good Russian films. As for American films, I see them very selectively.
I almost never see action films or thrillers, especially American. My favorite genre is tragicomedy, as the Russian films Dom durakov (House of Fools) by Andrei Konchalovsky, Svadba (Wedding) by Pavel Lungin or the Swedish Tillsammans (Together) by Lukas Moodysson.
I'd like to see the best films of all time made in various countries, and recently I could see quite a number of films published by Creterion.
I've been also looking through various lists of the best films and in this respect I found particularly useful the Les films-clés du cinéma by C. Beylie (Larousse, 2002).
Here are three lists of films (by region), which I have seen during about the last 30 years:
I have graded films on the 10-point scale, e.g. [8]. Films that I don't remember well are left ungraded. I also marked with an asterisk (*) the foreign films that I saw in the USSR in the 1970s - 80s.
I think the best and the cheapest is Zip.ca. Unlike other DVD rental clubs, it has a large section of foreign films devided into several sub-sections (Russian, Scandinavian, etc.).
Of course, they have lots of trash made in the USA -- that's what an average Canadian prefers to watch. Still, due to the sheer size of their stock (over 40,000 DVDs), you will find many more good films (esp. Russian and European ones) in Zip.ca than elsewhere in Canada.
The delivery is fast, too -- they ship from Ottawa and I usually get the films in Quebec City on the second day.
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