| Note: This is the Russian dubbed version of the film, the original dialogue was in Estonian, thanks to indrekparli for mentioning in as well, in the comments section. In 1979, two Soviet science-fiction films were released, both of the screenplays (and the original novels upon which they were based) were written by the legendary Russian science-fiction authors and brothers Boris and the late Arkadiy Strugatskiy. The first, 'Stalker', directed by the most well known Russian director, the late Andrey Tarkovskiy, has become legendary and most serious film aficionados have seen it (I first saw it as a very young teenager in the early 80s on Channel 4 in the UK, clandestinely viewing it on a tiny black and white portable and for me it was the celluloid equivalent of being poked in the third eye with a freaky cosmic Zen master's stick). The second film 'Hukkunud Alpinisti' hotell', roughly translated as 'The Dead Mountaineer Hotel' was made in Estonia and directed by the late Estonian director Grigori Kromanov (aside from a couple of animations and shorts it was the only Estonian sci-fi film of the communist era I think) and seems to have sank down the Soviet memory hole without many traces left (as far as I know, no official DVD has ever been released and this is the best TV rip you are going to find). The film is the story of police officer in a sparsely populated hotel in the Alps. After the hotel is cut off from the outside world by an avalanche, strange things begin to ... |
