Shakeup in the Republics Video
These four clips track the Caucasus anti-corruption shakeup from the regime it toppled to the cinema it sponsored. A 1971 newsreel shows Mzhavanadze welcoming Brezhnev to Tbilisi at the peak of public ceremony, sixteen months before his quiet disgrace. The rest belong to the new leadership of Aliev and Shevardnadze. Mimino supplies the charming friendship-of-peoples face of consolidation, a Georgian pilot and Armenian driver improbably bonding in Moscow. The Interrogation dramatizes the cleanup itself, an honest investigator blocked by the bribe-taking judges above him. Earliest of all, the satirical sketch Mozalan mocked the shadow economy in 1971 -- shielded from Moscow's notice by running only in Azerbaijani.
Novosti dnia, No. 19, 1971 (Tbilisi). Mzhavanadze fêtes Brezhnev, months before his fall.
Georgii Daneliia: Mimino (1977). Georgian and Armenian friendship as charming Soviet consolidation.
The Interrogation / İstintaq (1979). Honest investigator versus bribe-taking judges, on screen.
Mozalan, No. 4 (1971). Azerbaijani satire of graft, hidden from Moscow by language.