August 4: Boris Laskin, author of "Three Tankmen" and screenwriter of "Carnival Night"
On August 4, 1914, Boris Laskin was born near Mogilev. He was a songwriter and screenwriter, author of the lyrics to the songs "Three Tankers" and "The Dark Mounds Sleep," and one of the screenwriters for the comedy "Carnival Night."
On the border of the cloud go grim,
The edge of a severe silence embraced.
At the high banks of the Amur
Homeland clocks stand
Childhood and first poems
Laskin's parents were of Jewish descent. His father died when Boris was still a preschooler, after which the boy moved to Moscow with his mother and brother.
At the age of 10, he began writing poetry. One day, he sent it to Maxim Gorky and soon received a reply from Sorrento, where the writer was then living. Gorky encouraged the young poet to take up describing the world around him and paid for a year's subscription to the journal "Literary Studies."
At the age of 12, Laskin already wrote:
Again the sounds of the siren whistle,
Life again and nervous itch:
“They’re burying Lenin today, mister!”
Traffic is interrupted for 5 minutes!
From noisemaker to screenwriter
At 17, while still a student, Laskin entered the film industry, initially as a sound engineer: the first sound cinemas were just appearing in the USSR.
This is how a train was made. A meter-long piece of sheet iron, folded in half, lies on a carpet, and the iron is rhythmically struck with joints, like mortars, with felt-lined ends. These are the wheels. The horns are many-tonned and come in many different types. A well-dried flat drum with beaters produces the hum.
Or—on the screen, a man is walking through the snow. The snow crunches underfoot. And below the screen, a seventeen-year-old boy rubs a cloth bag filled with potato flour between his thumb and middle finger, in time with the steps on the screen. The resemblance is perfect.
He also appeared as an extra. In "Alexander Nevsky," he played a knight drowning in Lake Ladoga. In "Generation of Victors," his character, a student revolutionary, shouted, "Freedom for the Constituent Assembly!" He later worked as an assistant director.
In 1939 he graduated from the screenwriting department of the State Institute of Cinematography and served in the army, in the cavalry.
"Three Tankers" and Glory
Returning to cinema, Laskin became famous by writing song lyrics for the films “The Big Life” (“The Dark Mounds Are Sleeping”) and “Tractor Drivers” (“The Tankers’ March,” “Three Tankers”).
The armor is strong, and our tanks are fast,
And our people are full of courage:
Soviet tank crews stand in line—
Sons of their great homeland
While working on the film, director Ivan Pyryev suddenly changed his mind and decided to begin it not with a live-action scene, but with a song. He gave the author, Boris Laskin, a strict deadline: 24 hours.
I said I'd think about it and left the director's office somewhat confused. I'd never been to the border, and I'd never seen our tank crews in action. Although I had a certain impression of this formidable branch of the military.
Half an hour after Laskin showed his lyrics to the composers, the Pokrass brothers, the song was ready.
War and frontline songs
Laskin did not fight in the Great Patriotic War, having suffered severely from tuberculosis. He worked as a war correspondent, wrote for front-line newspapers and theaters, and wrote a play about female pilots, "Heavenly Creatures," which later ran for many years at the Theater of the Soviet Army.
He was at the Reichstag and posed for a photo with the sign "We came here so you wouldn't come to us" (from his diaries). He never took his songs seriously, treating them like a game.
In 1945, together with Naum Labkovsky, he wrote "The Song of a Frontline Driver" ("Oh, the Frontline Road") for the film "The Great Turning Point." It was performed by the driver Minutka, played by Mark Bernes.
"Girl with a Guitar" and "Carnival Night"
Laskin created songs for the film "Girl with a Guitar" starring the legendary saleswoman Tanya, played by Lyudmila Gurchenko.
I work in a music store,
I find joy in life in this matter.
I follow my trading plan every day,
The one given by the ministry from above
Lucy Lucy, I'm afraid
That I will be carried away by you.
If, Lucy, I get carried away
Then I'm afraid for myself
He co-wrote the screenplays for the films "Give Me the Complaint Book" (with Alexander Galich) and "Carnival Night" (with Vladimir Polyakov). He also created the character of the bureaucrat Ogurtsov and the fable "The Bear at the Ball," which the accountant reads.
We won't hire Baba Yaga from outside. We'll raise her within our own team.
"You have to know your superiors by sight!"
“I don’t like to joke myself, and I won’t let people do it either.”
Boris Laskin died in 1983 in Moscow, at the age of 69.
