Cute animated credits in both Uzbek and Russian introduce
Klych, a charming children’s film that for many years was
the only Uzbek film specifically produced for kids.
Klych is an
endearing, mischievous boy living in a remote Uzbek kishlak
(a rural settlement) who has never been to the city. He’s
been dreaming about riding in a steam locomotive ever since
he heard about them, and one day he gets his chance when
a friendly train engineer takes him to the capital, Tashkent.
The surrounding world is seen through the little boy’s wonderfilled eyes, captivated by the locomotive’s wheels, pistons,
and cylinders that look fabulously large and make a stunning
impression on him.
Once in the city, Klych takes a streetcar for the first time
and visits a kindergarten with many toys.
All these positive
impressions as he beholds the marvels of urban plenitude and
advancement are clearly designed to instill similar sensations
in young viewers, introducing them to the values expected of
Soviet youth. The sincerity and honesty of the debuting child
performers, together with their cheerful faces, effortlessly
carry the ideological message of how a representative of the new Socialist society should behave. The goal wasn’t just that
viewers should follow a set of prescribed rules and identify with
the characters, but that they should work towards this ideal for
themselves.
Klych is the directorial debut of Iuldash Agzamov (1909-1985),
one of the key figures of Central Asian cinema, who would go
on to make several landmarks of Uzbek film heritage. Beginning
his cinema career as an actor in 1927, Agzamov is credited as
assistant director on Grigorii Cherniak’s Her Right, also in this
year’s programme, working steadily as a director especially from
the 1950s through the early 1980s, responsible for newsreels
and documentaries as well as features. – Nigora Karimova
