The Diamond Arm
Encyclopedia
The Diamond Arm is a 1968 Soviet comedy film
filmed by Mosfilm
and first released in 1968. The film was directed by slapstick
director Leonid Gaidai
and starred several famous Soviet actors, including Yuri Nikulin
, Andrei Mironov
, Anatoli Papanov
, Nonna Mordyukova
and Svetlana Svetlichnaya
. The Diamond Arm has become a Russian cult film
. It was also one of the all-time leaders at the Soviet box office with over 76,700,000 theatre admissions in the Soviet era.
of a courier. The contraband ends up in the cast on the arm of "ordinary Soviet citizen" Semyon Semyonovich Gorbunkov who gets mistaken for the courier while on a cruise shore excursion. He lets the militsiya
know about this, and the militsiya captain uses Gorbunkov as bait to catch the criminals. Most of the plot are various attempts of two inept crooks, Lyolik and Gennadiy Kozodoyev,to lure Gorbunkov into a situation where they could have quietly, without a wet job, taken the cast off him.
The metaphorical song "About Hares" ("Песня про зайцев") became a popular song during the late 60's. It tells a story of some poor, terrified hare
s stealthily cutting the grass (or weed) at nighttime, despite their fears of some frightening forest shadows. Still, the hares boldly sing their refrain that can be roughly translated as "For us it's all the same!" ("A нам всё равно!"). Nowadays the song is also a popular hint to the cannabis
as the weed in the lyrics is mysteriously named by a nonsense word
"tryn".
Sang in the movie by the protagonist Semyon Gorbunkov after heavy dose of vodka
at the restaurant
. The scene was even later depicted on a stamp
dedicated to the actor. Recorded by Yuri Nikulin
himself.
The Island of No Luck
Ironical "The Island of No Luck" ("Остров невезения"). Sang in the movie by the Kozlodoyev.
Comedy film
Comedy film is a genre of film in which the main emphasis is on humour. They are designed to elicit laughter from the audience. Comedies are mostly light-hearted dramas and are made to amuse and entertain the audiences...
filmed by Mosfilm
Mosfilm
Mosfilm is a film studio, which is often described as the largest and oldest in Russia and in Europe. Its output includes most of the more widely-acclaimed Soviet films, ranging from works by Tarkovsky and Eisenstein , to Red Westerns, to the Akira Kurosawa co-production and the epic Война и Мир...
and first released in 1968. The film was directed by slapstick
Slapstick
Slapstick is a type of comedy involving exaggerated violence and activities which may exceed the boundaries of common sense.- Origins :The phrase comes from the batacchio or bataccio — called the 'slap stick' in English — a club-like object composed of two wooden slats used in Commedia dell'arte...
director Leonid Gaidai
Leonid Gaidai
Leonid Iovich Gaidai was one of the most popular Soviet comedy directors, enjoying immense popularity and broad public recognition in the former USSR & modern Russia...
and starred several famous Soviet actors, including Yuri Nikulin
Yuri Nikulin
Yuri Vladimirovich Nikulin was a well-known Soviet and Russian actor and clown who starred in many popular films.He was awarded the title of People's Artist of the USSR in 1973 and Hero of Socialist Labour in 1990...
, Andrei Mironov
Andrei Mironov
Andrei Alexandrovich Mironov was a Soviet theatre and film actor who played lead roles in some of the most popular Soviet films, such as The Diamond Arm, Beware of the Car and Twelve Chairs...
, Anatoli Papanov
Anatoli Papanov
Anatoli Dmitrievich Papanov was a popular Soviet film and theatre actor.Papanov starred in some of the best and well-known Soviet films, often together with his friend, Andrei Mironov. Mostly known for his great performances in comedies, he also had serious and dramatic roles, such as that of the...
, Nonna Mordyukova
Nonna Mordyukova
Noyabrina "Nonna" Viktorovna Mordyukova was a Soviet actress and People's Artist of the USSR...
and Svetlana Svetlichnaya
Svetlana Svetlichnaya
Svetlana Afanasyevna Svetlichnaya is a Soviet and Russian actress most famous for her role in The Diamond Arm .-Biography:...
. The Diamond Arm has become a Russian cult film
Cult film
A cult film, also commonly referred to as a cult classic, is a film that has acquired a highly devoted but specific group of fans. Often, cult movies have failed to achieve fame outside the small fanbases; however, there have been exceptions that have managed to gain fame among mainstream audiences...
. It was also one of the all-time leaders at the Soviet box office with over 76,700,000 theatre admissions in the Soviet era.
Plot
The boss of a black market ring (known only as "The Chief") wants to smuggle a batch of jewelry into the Soviet Union by hiding it into the orthopedic castOrthopedic cast
An orthopedic cast, body cast or surgical cast, is a shell, frequently made from plaster, encasing a limb to hold a broken bone in place until healing is confirmed...
of a courier. The contraband ends up in the cast on the arm of "ordinary Soviet citizen" Semyon Semyonovich Gorbunkov who gets mistaken for the courier while on a cruise shore excursion. He lets the militsiya
Militsiya
Militsiya or militia is used as an official name of the civilian police in several former communist states, despite its original military connotation...
know about this, and the militsiya captain uses Gorbunkov as bait to catch the criminals. Most of the plot are various attempts of two inept crooks, Lyolik and Gennadiy Kozodoyev,to lure Gorbunkov into a situation where they could have quietly, without a wet job, taken the cast off him.
Cast
- Yuri NikulinYuri NikulinYuri Vladimirovich Nikulin was a well-known Soviet and Russian actor and clown who starred in many popular films.He was awarded the title of People's Artist of the USSR in 1973 and Hero of Socialist Labour in 1990...
, Semyon Semyonovich Gorbunkov, an economist at Giproryba - Nina Grebeshkova, Nadia, Gorbunkov's wife
- Andrei MironovAndrei MironovAndrei Alexandrovich Mironov was a Soviet theatre and film actor who played lead roles in some of the most popular Soviet films, such as The Diamond Arm, Beware of the Car and Twelve Chairs...
, Gennadiy Kozodoyev, aka Gesha, a male model - Anatoli PapanovAnatoli PapanovAnatoli Dmitrievich Papanov was a popular Soviet film and theatre actor.Papanov starred in some of the best and well-known Soviet films, often together with his friend, Andrei Mironov. Mostly known for his great performances in comedies, he also had serious and dramatic roles, such as that of the...
, Lyolik, chief's assistant - Nonna MordyukovaNonna MordyukovaNoyabrina "Nonna" Viktorovna Mordyukova was a Soviet actress and People's Artist of the USSR...
, Varvara Pliushch, building superintendent - Svetlana SvetlichnayaSvetlana SvetlichnayaSvetlana Afanasyevna Svetlichnaya is a Soviet and Russian actress most famous for her role in The Diamond Arm .-Biography:...
, Anna Sergeyevna, a femme fatale - Andrei FajtAndrei FajtAndrei Fajt was a Soviet film actor. He appeared in 44 films between 1925 and 1976.He was born in Nizhny Novgorod, Russia and died in Moscow.-Selected filmography:* The Battleship Potemkin...
, salesman of lottery tickets, visitor of the restaurant "Weeping willow" - Nikolay Trofimov, Colonel of militsiyaMilitsiyaMilitsiya or militia is used as an official name of the civilian police in several former communist states, despite its original military connotation...
- Oleksandr KhvyliaOleksandr KhvyliaAlexander Leopoldovich Khvylya was a Soviet Ukrainian theater and film actor who played in The Diamond Arm, The end of Chyrva Kozyr, Bohdan Khmelnytsky, and others....
, Boris Savelyevich, maitre d' - Tatyana Nikulina, Istanbul tour guide
- Maksim Nikulin, boy with a net (not credited)
- Leonid GaidaiLeonid GaidaiLeonid Iovich Gaidai was one of the most popular Soviet comedy directors, enjoying immense popularity and broad public recognition in the former USSR & modern Russia...
, alcoholic (not credited)
Catch phrases
Nearly every expression from the movie became popular in Russian culture or has passed into everyday use.- "As a friend of mine... deceased now... used to say - I knew too much..."
- "And if the tenants refuse (to buy lottery tickets), we'll shut off the gas supply!"
- "A dog is man's best friend!" ---"Well, maybe in London a dog is man's best friend, but over here it's the UPRAVDOM (apartment manager)." (The upravdom woman finally became a caricature of a seemingly petty but influential social bureaucrat.)
- "Only aristocrats and degenerates drink champagne in the morning..." (Шампанское по утрам пьют только аристократы или дегенераты) (pauses, checks out the bottle and drinks right from it)
- (tears in his eyes) "They might even give me an award... post-humo-usly!" (sniffs)
- "You should come over and visit us in KolymaKolymaThe Kolyma region is located in the far north-eastern area of Russia in what is commonly known as Siberia but is actually part of the Russian Far East. It is bounded by the East Siberian Sea and the Arctic Ocean in the north and the Sea of Okhotsk to the south...
(a harsh-climate prison region in Russia's Far North)." (Chokes on beer, coughing...) - "Thanks, but I'd rather you come here to see us." - "Tsigel, tsigel, ay-lyu-lyu (ay-loo-loo)!" Many people seriously think that "Tsigel" (Cigel, Ziegel) means "timeTimeTime is a part of the measuring system used to sequence events, to compare the durations of events and the intervals between them, and to quantify rates of change such as the motions of objects....
" in some foreign language. The (fictional) phrase "Ziegel, Ziegel, ay-lyu-lyu!" ("Цигель, цигель, ай-лю-лю!") expresses hurry and urgency, either for real or as a mockery. (Occasionally, Ziegel is "brickBrickA brick is a block of ceramic material used in masonry construction, usually laid using various kinds of mortar. It has been regarded as one of the longest lasting and strongest building materials used throughout history.-History:...
" in German and Yiddish.)- "Ay-lyu-lyu" is also a jocular reference to sex as in another quote "Tsigel, ay-lyu-lyu?" as coming from a (Turkish) street hooker but answered with a hurried "Ay-loo-loo later on!" ("ай-лю-лю потом").
- "As our beloved Chief likes to say..." (Now, sometimes used when quoting one's boss)
- "Strike the iron without walking away from the cash register" (Куй железо не отходя от кассы) (a portmanteau of a proverb "Strike while the iron is hot" and an instruction for customers by each Soviet cashier's desk: "Count your money before walking away from the cash register")
- "Even teetotallers and those with stomach ulcer will have a drink on someone else's tab!" In Russian it rhymes nicely: "За чужой счет пьют даже трезвенники... и язвенники!"
- "I haven't yet seen a husband who wouldn't want to become a bachelor for just an hour..."
- "If a person is an idiot, that lasts a long time" ("Если человек идиот, то это надолго")
- A curse: "May you live... only on your... PAYCHECK!" (Чтоб ты жил... на одну... ЗАРПЛАТУ!) ("May you live off your salary forever!" with an implication of "never live like a crook again")
- A curse: "May I see you in a coffin, in white slippers!" (Шоб я видел тя у гробу! У белых тапках!) (A catch phrase styled in the fashion of Odessa Jewish humour, but pronounced with some unidentified, mocked Ukrainian accent.)
- A mocking reproach: "Semyon Semyonych!..." (Of an absent-minded person to wake him up.)
- A comment to an embarrassing situation when a demoDemoDemo may refer to:*DEMOs, a business process design methodology by Jan Dietz*Demo , a comic book series by Brian Wood and Becky Cloonan*Demo , a non-interactive multimedia presentation...
fails: "With a casual hand gesture, the pantsTrousersTrousers are an item of clothing worn on the lower part of the body from the waist to the ankles, covering both legs separately...
are turning into... the pants are turning INTO... into a pair of elegant shortsShortsShorts are a bifurcated garment worn by both men and women over their pelvic area, circling the waist, and covering the upper part of the legs, sometimes extending down to or even below the knee, but not covering the entire length of the leg. They are called "shorts" because they are a shortened...
!" - "Obliko morale" a mockingly Italianized Russian term "moralny oblik" (моральный облик), "moral character", a part of the cliché "moral character of a Soviet person". In the film it was uttered by the character when he tried to circumnavigate a foreign prostitute: "Russo turisto! Obliko morale! Verstehen?".
- "Flowers for his woman, ice creamIce creamIce cream is a frozen dessert usually made from dairy products, such as milk and cream, and often combined with fruits or other ingredients and flavours. Most varieties contain sugar, although some are made with other sweeteners...
for the kids. And don't mix it up, KutuzovKutuzovKutuzov may refer to:* Mikhail Kutuzov, Russian field marshal during Napoleonic era* Named after Mikhail Kutuzov** Order of Kutuzov, military award** Kutuzov Embankment, embankment and street** Operation Kutuzov, military operation in WWII...
!" (Дитям мороженое, бабе цветы.... и не перепутай, Кутузов!) - "I'm innocent! I'm innocent! He came by himself!" ("Не виноватая я... Он сам пришёл!") (After Semyon Semyonovich was supposed to have "illegal" sex with a set-up call girl. Apparently, paroding Katyusha's lines from Dostoyevsky's The Brothers KaramazovThe Brothers KaramazovThe Brothers Karamazov is the final novel by the Russian author Fyodor Dostoyevsky. Dostoyevsky spent nearly two years writing The Brothers Karamazov, which was published as a serial in The Russian Messenger and completed in November 1880...
.) - "Ksiva... Haza... Klient... Bye-bye, boy!..." (The ID? The place? The client? Bye-bye, boy!) (A parody on underworld slang as coming from a professional hooker. The vocabularly is authentic, although rarely used in real slang. "Haza" probably originates from English "house" or Hungarian "ház" (house).)
- "I'm not a coward... But I'm scared..." "Я не трус, но я боюсь!"
- "I've got an idea: what if we could..." -- "We couldn't." -- "I see... Then, maybe we should..." -- "No, we shouldn't." -- "Okay... In that case, maybe I'd rather..." -- "Why not, you could try that one." (A caricature of a militsiyaMilitsiyaMilitsiya or militia is used as an official name of the civilian police in several former communist states, despite its original military connotation...
commander who is so astute that he is almost a mind-reader —a hidden allusion to the almighty and omniscient KGBKGBThe KGB was the commonly used acronym for the . It was the national security agency of the Soviet Union from 1954 until 1991, and was the premier internal security, intelligence, and secret police organization during that time.The State Security Agency of the Republic of Belarus currently uses the...
.) - "As they say, that is c'est la vie!" ("такова се-ля-ви") (c'est la vie is French for "that is life", in other words the phrase is a double mis-translation: "that is that is life" Also, cf. later Dovlatov's catch phrase "таково се-ля-ви" ("such is c'est la vie", where "such" is used in the neuter gender, as if alluding to the Russian word for "crap"), which is clearly patterned on this quote.)
- "Hmm, well, we'll have to take appropriate action... What else can we do?" -- the apartment manager, who really has no business in tenants' affairs
- "But Lyolik, that is not aesthetic!" -- "That's cheap, reliable and practical!" (rhymes nicely in Russian: "Лёлик, но это же не эстетично!" - "Зато дёшево, надёжно и практично.") (As preparing to hit Semyon Semyonovich on the head with a metal tool.)
- "I'll punch you carefully,... but hard!" ("Буду бить аккуратно, но сильно!")
- "Our people don't take a taxi to the bakery!" (In Russian: "Наши люди в булочную на такси не ездят!" (Mocking the cliché "our people" as referring to "the Soviet people" with "obliko morale". In fact, a catch phrase mocking the communist or socialist way of life in general.)
Soundtracks
The Song about RabbitsThe metaphorical song "About Hares" ("Песня про зайцев") became a popular song during the late 60's. It tells a story of some poor, terrified hare
Hare
Hares and jackrabbits are leporids belonging to the genus Lepus. Hares less than one year old are called leverets. Four species commonly known as types of hare are classified outside of Lepus: the hispid hare , and three species known as red rock hares .Hares are very fast-moving...
s stealthily cutting the grass (or weed) at nighttime, despite their fears of some frightening forest shadows. Still, the hares boldly sing their refrain that can be roughly translated as "For us it's all the same!" ("A нам всё равно!"). Nowadays the song is also a popular hint to the cannabis
Cannabis (drug)
Cannabis, also known as marijuana among many other names, refers to any number of preparations of the Cannabis plant intended for use as a psychoactive drug or for medicinal purposes. The English term marijuana comes from the Mexican Spanish word marihuana...
as the weed in the lyrics is mysteriously named by a nonsense word
Nonsense word
A nonsense word, unlike a sememe, may have no definition. If it can be pronounced according to a language's phonotactics, it is a logatome. Nonsense words are used in literature for poetic or humorous effect. Proper names of real or fictional entities are sometimes nonsense words.-See...
"tryn".
Sang in the movie by the protagonist Semyon Gorbunkov after heavy dose of vodka
Vodka
Vodka , is a distilled beverage. It is composed primarily of water and ethanol with traces of impurities and flavorings. Vodka is made by the distillation of fermented substances such as grains, potatoes, or sometimes fruits....
at the restaurant
Restaurant
A restaurant is an establishment which prepares and serves food and drink to customers in return for money. Meals are generally served and eaten on premises, but many restaurants also offer take-out and food delivery services...
. The scene was even later depicted on a stamp
Postage stamp
A postage stamp is a small piece of paper that is purchased and displayed on an item of mail as evidence of payment of postage. Typically, stamps are made from special paper, with a national designation and denomination on the face, and a gum adhesive on the reverse side...
dedicated to the actor. Recorded by Yuri Nikulin
Yuri Nikulin
Yuri Vladimirovich Nikulin was a well-known Soviet and Russian actor and clown who starred in many popular films.He was awarded the title of People's Artist of the USSR in 1973 and Hero of Socialist Labour in 1990...
himself.
The Island of No Luck
Ironical "The Island of No Luck" ("Остров невезения"). Sang in the movie by the Kozlodoyev.