The Mirror (Zerkalo) (Зеркало)

MOSFILM

Fourth Artists' Association

What is your first name, your last name?

My name is Yuri Zhary.

Where did you come from?

I came from Kharkov.

What school do you go to?

I go to a technical school.

Now we're going to have a seance.

You just look at me.

Look me in the eye.

Look in front of you.

Turn around, with your back to me.

Concentrate on my hand.

My hand is drawing you back.

Spread your hands.

Concentrate. All your tension is centered in your hands.

Your hands are strained!

Concentrate all of your will power,

your big desire to win, on your hands.

Your hands are getting more and more tense.

They're very tense. Still more tense.

Look at your fingers. Your fingers are tense.

From here the tension passes on to your fingers.

Look at your hands. Yura, concentrate!

On my count of three your hands will become immobile.

One, two, three! Your hands don't move.

You can't move them.

You're trying to move your hands, but they're fixed.

It's very hard for you to make a slightest movement.

Now I'm going to lift this transfixion,

and you'll be able to speak freely, easily and articulately.

From now on you will speak loudly and clearly.

Look at me.

I'm lifting the tension from your hands and your speech.

One, two, three!

Go ahead, say loudly and clearly: I can speak!

MIRROR

Margarita TEREKHOVA as Mother and Natalya

Written by Alexander MISHARIN and Andrei TARKOVSKY

Directed by Andrei TARKOVSKY

Director of Photography Georgy RERBERG

Production Designer Nikolai DVIGUBSKY

Music by Eduard ARTEMYEV

Sound by Semyon LITVINOV

English Subtitles by Tatiana KAMENEVA

Also starring

I. DANILTSEV L. TARKOVSKAYA, A. DEMIDOVA

A. SOLONITSYN N. GRINKO

T. OGORODNIKOVA Yu. NAZAROV, O. YANKOVSKY

F. YANKOVSKY Yu. SVENTIKOV, T. RESHETNIKOVA

Author's text narrated by I. SMOKTUNOVSKY

Verses by Arseny TARKOVSKY recited by the author

Playing in the film music by J.S. Bach, Pergolesi, Purcell

MIRROR

The road from the station passed through Ignatievo,

then swerved near the farm

we had lived on each summer before the war,

and through a dense oak forest went on as far as Tomshino.

Usually we spotted our people

as soon as they appeared from behind a bush in the mid-field.

If he turned from the bush towards our house, then it's father.

If not, it meant it was not father

and that father would never come.

Am I going the right way to Tomshino?

You shouldn't have taken a turn at the bush.

– And this… What's this?… – What?

Why are you sitting here?

– I live here. – Where? On the fence?

Are you interested in the way to Tomshino or where I live?

I brought all the instruments, but forgot the key.

Do you happen to have a nail or a screw-driver?

I don't have any nails.

Why are you so nervous?

Give me your hand. I'm a doctor.

You're bothering me.

Do you want me to call my husband?

You haven't got any husband. There's no ring.

Though people don't wear rings nowadays. Maybe only old people.

May I have a cigarette?

Why do you look so sad?

And why do you look so happy?

It's a pleasure to fall down with an attractive woman.

You know, I fell and found strange things here – roots, bushes…

Has it ever occurred to you

that plants can feel, know, even comprehend…

The trees, this hazel-nut bush…

– This is the alder-tree. – It doesn't matter.

They don't run about.

Like us who are rushing, fussing, uttering banalities.

That's because we don't trust nature that is inside us.

Always this suspiciousness, haste,

and no time to stop and think.

Look, you seem to be a bit…

It's no problem for me. I'm a doctor.

And what about "Ward Number Six"?

Oh, Chekhov had made it all up!

Come to Tomshino sometime. We often have a good time there.

You've got blood!

– Where? – Behind your ear.

Each moment of our dates, not many,

We celebrated as an Epiphany.

Alone in the whole world.

More daring and lighter than a bird

Down the stairs, like a dizzy apparition,

You came to take me on your road, Through rain-soaked lilacs,

To your own possession, To the looking glass world.

As night descended

I was blessed with grace,

The altar gate opened up,

And in the darkness shining

And slowly reclining Was your body naked.

On waking up I said: God bless you!

Although I knew how daring and undue

My blessing was: You were fast asleep,

Your closed eyelids with the universal blue

The lilac on the table so strained to sweep.

Touched by the blue, your lids

Were quite serene, your hand was warm.

And rivers pulsed in crystal slits,

Mountains smoked, and oceans swarmed.

You held a sphere in your palm,

Of crystal; on your throne you were sleeping calm.

And, oh my God! – Belonging only to me,

You woke and at once transformed

The language humans speak and think.

Speech rushed up sonorously formed,

With the word "you" so much reformed

As to evolve a new sense meaning king.

And suddenly all changed, like in a trance,

Even trivial things, so often used and tried,

When standing 'tween us, guarding us,

Was water, solid, stratified.

It carried us I don't know where.

Retreating before us, like some mirage,

Were cities, miraculously fair.

Under our feet the mint grass spread,

The birds were following our tread,

The fishes came to a river bend,

And to our eyes the sky was open.

Behind us our fate was groping,

Like an insane man with a razor in his hand.

Oh, good heavens! Dounya!

What is it, Pasha?!

A fire! But be quiet.

He'll get it coming to him!

And what if Vitya is in there? What if he's burned?

Where's Klanya?

What?

Dad!

– Alexei? – Hello, ma!

What's wrong with your voice?

Nothing serious. I guess it's just a sore throat.

I haven't spoken to anyone for three days.

I even liked it. I think it's good to keep silent for a while.

Words can't express everything

a person feels. Words are flaccid.

I just dreamed of you in my sleep.

As though I were still a child…

By the way, what year was it when dad left us?

1935. Why?

And the fire? Remember the hay-loft that burned down at the farm?

That was in "35 too.

All right, stop pulling the wool over my eyes.

You know… Lisa died.

The one I worked in the printing house with.

– Oh God… When? – This morning, at 7.

And what time is it now? What is now?

– Almost six. – In the morning?

What's the matter with you? In the evening.

Mom, why do we have to fight all the time?

I'm sorry if I did anything wrong.

Printing-house. Next stop: Serpukhovskaya.

What's the rush?

Hello.

Where're the proofs I've been reading?

I don't know. Just a minute.

Yelizaveta Pavlovna is here.

Marousia, what's wrong?

Something in yesterday's proofs?

In the Goslit edition? Don't be so nervous!

We should look in the typesetting case.

Nothing terrible has happened.

It's such an important edition!

Although misprints have no place in any edition.

Shut up, you idiot.

– What happened? – Nothing serious.

I just want to check something. I may be wrong…

Let's start from the beginning.

I'd rather do it myself.

Everybody's rushing, no one's got any time!

You think I'm afraid?

No, let other people be afraid.

Some people should work, and others should be afraid.

Well, nothing awful has happened.

If it happened, it happened. We've been printing all night…

I waited for you since yesterday's morning.

That you won't come they probably guessed.

Remember what a beautiful weather it was?

A holiday weather! And I walked coatless.