Kingdom of Crooked Mirrors (1963)

Fresh and Exciting

It's hard to see any effort in the film. There's no comedy to speak of, no real drama and, worst of all.

It's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...

True to its essence, the characters remain on the same line and manage to entertain the viewer, each highlighting their own distinctive qualities or touches.

Well, I watched this movie many times so I think I can better explain what it is all about. Olya the girl in the beginning of the movie features her personal weaknesses, or bad habits, or let's call it sins. She is craving for grandma's jam so much, that she discards grandma's word no to touch the jam, and breaks the can as she tries to eat some. Also Olya is recreant, lazy, irresponsible, sweet-tooth to the extent of forgetting about more important things. In other words Olya features a number of bad habits typical for children of her age. And through possession of these bad habits she becomes attracted to the fairy-tale surreal world of "Kingdom of crooked mirrors" which in fact is some kind of anti-world where all inhabitants bear reversed names to be read backwards to understand the true nature of the character. The kingdom is ruled by bizarre and evil characters featuring different animals like Parrot, Adder, Falcon, Toad (all shall be read backwards), and in fact represent a fake and gullish monarch Parrot, and three ruthless, cunning and power loathing tycoons: Toad, Adder and Falcon, who really rule the Kingdom. Played by people dressed and made up accordingly. In order to cement their power over the Kingdom they lean upon what probably should be described as total and systematic lying, or people's mass misinformation, by producing and disseminating only crooked mirrors. For this end they arrested the mirror-maker Friend who refused to produce crooked mirrors. So the CMK world represents where do Olya's weaknesses or bad habits would finally take her if not eradicated timely and properly. During her trip in the Kingdom Olya is accompanied by her mirror twin Yalio, who has no bad habits, but acts accordingly to her age. The main goal is to free the mirror-maker Friend from the Death Tower, which means the end of the Kingdom of Crooked mirrors. Olya has to overcome her own weaknesses and bad habits on her way to the goal, otherwise the ruling of Adder, Falcon, and Toad will never end. It is important to understand that in the USSR production of movies was controlled by Art councils, so the final product is kinda a balance between the movie director and Art council, therefore something resembling propaganda can sometimes be expected. But if you understand the entire story and the plot, you will see that Kingdom is a materialization of one's bad habits taken to the logical absolute to show to kids how important is to take an active and firm position in life and to stick to the truth, that in adult life you will have to take an active position, you will have to distinguish your friends from enemies, and you will have to act accordingly. Well, from the point of view of Adder, Falcon, and Toad this must be a very dangerous propaganda.

Crazy child story that seems to mirror (cough, sorry, cough) "Alice in Wonderland" in some aspects, but that also seems to be a critic of the ones on the other side back on that era (the end of the movie says it all, with the woman looking at the camera and sending a very clear message to the viewer), "Korolevstvo krivykh zerkal" is quite the strange movie.The story goes around Olya, who gets home after watching a movie she shouldn't have, loses the flat's key, gets scared because of some boys and ends breaking a plums jar. Just after breaking the jar, she discovers she has a 'mirror' self on the other side of the... mirror (yes, I know...). She crosses and we get Olya and Alyo, who join forces to search for their cats and get entangled with the politics of the mirror world's kingdom, a plot to kill the king, trying to save a boy who is going to be killed because he is making 'straight' instead of 'crooked' mirrors... All in quite the psychedelic world.The story is very simple to follow (even if the developments are quite arbitrary), but it is enjoyable enough, with all the twisted characters, silly adventures, and camp clothes and cheesy dialogue. It is original enough, and the acting and direction accompany the story quite well, making this "Korolevstvo krivykh zerkal" an interesting little curio.

People, people! This film is nothing like Alice in Wonderland and forget about "cheap special effects." This is a Soviet film from the 60's after all. The broken jar has nothing to do with special mushrooms. Tarrop is not like criticisms of W; its a tongue-and-cheek criticism of "rotten capitalism". Its pure and abashed sly propaganda aimed at children. But of course, having watched it as a kid growing up in USSR, you get engrossed with the actual fairy-tales aspects of having strong friendships, being honest, etc.. Yes, in Soviet films, they always made girls' dresses short, but in schools you would be kicked out if your dress was shorter than knee-length. Part of that was to project a young naive perfect little Pioneer girls who were completely asexual. But you have to remember that during Soviet times we, youngsters, played outside, by ourselves, past midnight and never even wondered if we would get kidnapped. It was safer for kids there in that respect. Otherwise, it was a straight-forward propaganda tale that also taught kids good moral qualities, without all the super-junky-sugar coat freakiness of Disney cartoons. It is reminiscent of the cartoon "Three Fatsos" where there is also a commentary against imperialist enslavement of people via classism and basically call for unity of proletariats. Or even an Italian story of "Adventures of Chipollino". Again, everyone, it is not alike to Alice in Wonderland (how irritating and presumptuous)! It is a great Soviet classic!

Certain films leave a lasting impression, even though you cannot explain why. This film is dated and the quality of the special effects is questionable. Nonetheless, this movie has a lot of charm. It is actually quite exciting (my little cousins love it) and fun to watch.