Letyat Zhuravli (aka The Cranes Are Flying) (1957)

At the outbreak of WWII in the Soviet Union, two young lovers (Tatyana Samoylova, Aleksey Batalov) are separated when he goes to the war front. As months pass and Samojlova hasn't heard from Batalov, she despairs and after being raped by his brother (Aleksandr Shvorin) in her desperation she agrees to marry him. But her guilt over betraying her lover festers and threatens to destroy her. The winner of the Palme d'Or at the 1958 Cannes film festival (the film's title comes from Chekhov's THREE SISTERS), Mikhail Kalatozov's melodrama must have seemed near revolutionary at the time coming from Russia but without an agenda of pro communist, anti-western propaganda. But that aside, it's a heartbreaking saga of love, betrayal and guilt. Kalatozov was a professed admirer of Vincente Minnelli and this can clearly be seen by his homage to Minnelli's wartime romance THE CLOCK specifically in the parting at the station when Batalov goes off to war. The central performance by Samojlova (ANNA KARENINA) is wonderful and she has a screen presence worthy of an Audrey Hepburn. Kudoes too to Sergei urusevsky's stark B&W cinematography, the only sour note being Moisey Vaynberg's mediocre score. I can't imagine anyone not being touched by the film's finale.