“A small German town with a tricky name, which I immediately forgot. Somewhere in Eastern Germany. People have not lived here for a long time, and only occasionally tourists come to walk through the deserted, dilapidated streets.” In these photographs by Russian photographer Dmitry Chistoprudov, it looks like World War II ended just yesterday. And he almost had the internet fooled…
The destroyed ghost town that Chistoprudov documented and shared via his Live Journal site, was in fact a giant stage of trickery built by “Russian Hollywood”. Mosfilm is the largest and oldest film studio in Europe and the undisputed leader of the Russian film industry. By the time of the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Mosfilm had produced more than 3,000 films, including the most widely acclaimed Soviet-era films, Red Westerns, works by Tarkovsky and epics like War and Peace.
Today, Mosfilm produces more than one hundred films a year, boasts ten independent studios located within 13 sound stages, occupying an area of 13,000 sq. meters. They also offer tours through this “Russian Hollywood”, allowing visitors to view Mosfilm’s enormous depot with 170 tanks and 50 vintage cars, as well as entire towns constructed just for shooting a single scene. You can see what some of the other sets look like on their website.
(c) Dmitriy Christoprudov
(c) Dmitriy Christoprudov
(c) Dmitriy Christoprudov
(c) Dmitriy Christoprudov
(c) Dmitriy Christoprudov
(c) Dmitriy Christoprudov
