The fairy tale picturisation Morozko (father frost) as Soviet Operetta

Some fairy-tales gained worldwide popularity through their cinematographic adaptations. In particular, some communist countries in Eastern Europe built up a state-run entertainment industry that made fairy-tales into box office hits. One of the most famous directors of Soyuzdetfilm, the Soviet film studio for the young, was Aleksandr Rou, whose movies were also hits in the GDR. The analysis of one of his films, Morozko (1964/65), argues that fairy-tale movies were a popular means both of Soviet education and of the propagation of the Russian national idea ( Soviet style). For his adaptation, Rou drew on the artistic language developed by musicians and painters at the end of the nineteenth century. Thus, Morozko follows the model of the national opera, developed by Rimsky-Korsakov, who in turn had made use of fairy-tales. Morozko thus became a kind of Soviet operetta.