The film is based on the feuilleton of the same name by I. Ilf and E. Petrov. A writer named Moldovantsev delivers a thrilling Soviet‐style Robinson Crusoe adventure on deadline, only to have his editor insist on adding a local party chairman, freed ex‐members, an activist collector, a housing committee and even a meeting table, bell and ledger washed ashore. Reluctantly he complies, so far that he jettisons Robinson himself as an unjustified weakling, transforming his novel into an absurd manifesto of bureaucratic excess.

Rating: 8

Cast:

Sergei

Filippov

Pavel

Tarasov

Georgiy

Kulikov

Pyotr

Repnin

Igor

Sretensky

Anatoliy

Papanov

Sergei

Filippov

Pavel

Tarasov

Georgiy

Kulikov

Pyotr

Repnin

Igor

Sretensky

Anatoliy

Papanov

Sergei

Filippov

Pavel

Tarasov

Georgiy

Kulikov

Pyotr

Repnin