In this important new book, Sudha Rajagopalan explores the consumption of Indian popular cinema in post-Stalinist Soviet society. In doing so, she highlights the enthusiastic response Indian popular films and their stars received from the Soviet audience, as well as the discursive and institutional context in which this consumption occurred from the mid-fifties till the end of the Soviet era in 1991.The death of Stalin in 1953 was followed by the introduction of important changes in government policy in the Soviet Union, including a relative liberalisation of leisure and culture which revealed the state s resurgent interest in addressing popular tastes. The renewed import and screening of foreign entertainment films in the Soviet Union was one of the most visible outcomes of this change. Drawing on oral history methodology and archival research in Russia, the author analyses the ways in which Soviet movie-goers, policy makers, critics and sociologists responded to, interpreted and debated Indian cinema in the Soviet Union between 1954 and the end of the eighties. Complemented by contemporary press and archival photos which capture the rapturous reception given to actors like Raj Kapoor, Nargis, Shashi Kapoor, Amitabh Bachchan and Mithun Chakraborty as well as Soviet film posters announcing films like Awara, Betaab and Chandni, this engaging book, which is also the first monograph on Indian cinema abroad among non-diasporic audiences, is a must-read not only for students and scholars of film history and cultural studies, but every such lay reader who has grown up on a regular diet of popular Indian cinema.

Do you eat, drink, sleep, think Hindi Cinema all the time like an obsession? Then we are already friends and sure going to have a great time together discovering many hidden and interesting facts about Hindi Cinema. Facts that are not just two-line trivia but studied in depth along with other finer details about the subject. For instance: • The ageless Guide and its English version • The spiritual connect in Silsila and Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi • Bertrand Russell & Jagjit Singh in a Hindi film cameo • A bold film suggesting castration for rapists in 1988 • Utpal Dutt - not just a comedian • The two Hindi film songs that won the Grammy Award • Amitabh-Bally Sagoo’s Aby Baby and Adalat • The lost art of riddle-based songs in Hindi film music • Three unusually sensual movies by Hrishikesh Mukherjee • Shocking Hindi films made on the subject of Incest And if this all sounds interesting, then do give it a try as ‘Picture Abhi Baaki Hai, Dost”

The period from Stalin’s death in 1953 to the end of the 1960s marked a crucial epoch in Soviet history. Though not overtly revolutionary, this era produced significant shifts in policies, ideas, language, artistic practices, daily behaviours, and material life. It was also during this time that social, cultural, and intellectual processes in the USSR began to parallel those in the West (and particularly in Europe) as never before. This volume examines in fascinating detail the various facets of Soviet life during the 1950s and 1960s, a period termed the ‘Thaw.’ Featuring innovative research by historical, literary, and film scholars from across the world, this book helps to answer fundamental questions about the nature and ultimate fortune of the Soviet order – both in its internal dynamics and in its long-term and global perspectives.

Taking the achievements, ambiguities, and legacies of World War II as a point of departure, The Shadow of War: The Soviet Union and Russia, 1941 to the Present offers a fresh new approach to modern Soviet and Russian history. Presents one of the only histories of the Soviet Union and Russia that begins with World War II and goes beyond the Soviet collapse through to the early twenty-first century Innovative thematic arrangement and approach allows for insights that are missed in chronological histories Draws on a wide range of sources and the very latest research on post-Soviet history, a rapidly developing field Supported by further reading, bibliography, maps and illustrations.

When Nikita Khrushchev visited Hollywood in 1959 only to be scandalized by a group of scantily clad actresses, his message was blunt: Soviet culture would soon consign the mass culture of the West, epitomized by Hollywood, to the "dustbin of history." In Moscow Prime Time, a portrait of the Soviet broadcasting and film industries and of everyday Soviet consumers from the end of World War II through the 1970s, Kristin Roth-Ey shows us how and why Khrushchev’s ambitious vision ultimately failed to materialize. The USSR surged full force into the modern media age after World War II, building cultural infrastructures—and audiences—that were among the world’s largest. Soviet people were enthusiastic radio listeners, TV watchers, and moviegoers, and the great bulk of what they were consuming was not the dissident culture that made headlines in the West, but orthodox, made-in-the-USSR content. This, then, was Soviet culture’s real prime time and a major achievement for a regime that had long touted easy, everyday access to a socialist cultural experience as a birthright. Yet Soviet success also brought complex and unintended consequences. Emphasizing such factors as the rise of the single-family household and of a more sophisticated consumer culture, the long reach and seductive influence of foreign media, and the workings of professional pride and raw ambition in the media industries, Roth-Ey shows a Soviet media empire transformed from within in the postwar era. The result, she finds, was something dynamic and volatile: a new Soviet culture, with its center of gravity shifted from the lecture hall to the living room, and a new brand of cultural experience, at once personal, immediate, and eclectic—a new Soviet culture increasingly similar, in fact, to that of its self-defined enemy, the mass culture of the West. By the 1970s, the Soviet media empire, stretching far beyond its founders’ wildest dreams, was busily undermining the very promise of a unique Soviet culture—and visibly losing the cultural cold war. Moscow Prime Time is the first book to untangle the paradoxes of Soviet success and failure in the postwar media age.

When PRESIDENT RUMP'S buttocks explode to the size of Texas, someone is to blame, and it's certainly not him... Approximately 11,000 words. For children ages 12 and up. Descriptions of my other popular children's books are included after the main feature (an additional 5 pages). WARNING: Hairy butts and zany politics round out this rabid pizza pie!

Lobster Bisque, anyone? How about a nice, big piece of Tira Misu? Filled with pepperoni, of course… And did somebody say pizza? Buckle up, buster, because this disco dancing frog is no joke, and evil doesn’t stand a chance against the super spy stomach of the swamp. (Unless his tummy starts rumbling or the world runs out of Ding Dongs…) Enjoy the first eight episodes from the ongoing serial novel Secret Agent Disco Dancer, including the following smash hits: SIDE A Green Eggs and a Side of Earnest Bacon Double Agent Orangegrove Was It the Lobster Bisque? The Last Ding Dong on Earth SIDE B Did Somebody Say Pizza? Frosted Flake Was It the Tira Misu? Burger Blues Over 350 pages in all. Descriptions of my other popular children's books are included after the main feature (an additional 5 pages). BONUS: Burger Blues Side Story is also included!