From Russia with Rock

In December 1987, a seven-day rock festival was staged in Moscow, the first ever such event in the Soviet Union. Mykkanen and her crew were there to cover the festival, a mixture of state-sanctioned pop and 'underground' Soviet bands, many of whom belong to a Moscow-based collection, Rock Laboratory. One band, Nautilius Pompilius from Siberia, shot into the charts as a result of their festival appearance, and the last third of the film records their reactions to fame and final retreat to Siberia. Throughout, there is a sense of the importance of rock music to young Russians, their enthusiastic embrace of perestroika, and, sadly, a sense that the medium is totally played out in the West.