The State Film Archive of Russia presents
A Ladislas Starevich film
The Beautiful Lucanida,
or The Battle of the Horned and the Whiskered
The castle of King Cervus is having a magnificent ball.
Music thunders: to the captivating sounds of a waltz whirl lavishly dressed guests.
Cervus himself with his beautiful wife, Queen Lucanida,
sits majestically on the throne.
Today he has a special guest of honor: Count Heros,
whose name resounds throughout the land.
At the sight of the beautiful Lucanida,
Heros is amazed by her grace, elegance and beauty.
He instantly falls in love with her.
The queen is also pleasantly surprised by the stately posture of the valiant Heros.
She takes him by the hand and follows him to the park.
Here Heros wants to reveal his feelings for the beautiful Lucanida.
Here, to the sound of a bubbling fountain,
to the rustle of leaves, to the magical sounds of a waltz heard from afar,
a charming confession escapes his lips.
Meanwhile,
the lovers do not suspect that one of the sentries, seeing them in the park,
hurried to King Cervus with a report of Lucanida's treason.
"You lie! You lie, despicable wretch!"
angrily exclaimed Cervus, on hearing the sentry's report.
"How can this be?! My beautiful Lucanida, the beauty and pride of the whole country,
the whole country of the Horned, is betraying me?"
"Follow me, great lord, and you will see
that I'm not lying,"
whispered the sentry.
And here is the secluded corner of the park where Heros is making vows of his eternal love to Lucanida:
"I swear upon my Whiskered honor," he exclaims,
"I have never seen a beauty to match yours, Lucanida!
My heart has never beat so strongly,
nor stilled so sweetly, as when it is near you."
And the beautiful Lucanida leans her head against his chest.
Suddenly there is an angry exclamation:
Traitor! So that is how you keep your vows! And you, Count,
have you forgotten the laws of hospitality?
You have trampled my honor!
Come forth to battle! We shall duel as befits knights!"
Poor Lucanida, hearing such wrathful words, hurries to escape.
But Heros and Cervus draw their swords,
and the duel begins.
At last, with a lucky blow, Heros knocks the sword out of Cervus's hands.
Cervus falls to his knees, expecting
at any moment the enemy's sword to pierce his heart, but the noble enemy
limits himself to merely walking away.
Meanwhile, on the outskirts of the park,
where a foamy waterfall falls from the rocky cliffs into the river,
poor Lucanida, crying her heart out, decides to end her life.
She throws herself into the river.
Fortunately, Heros notices her act in time.
The brave knight rushes in after her and manages to save her!
Having swum with her to the other shore,
where a luxurious palanquin is already waiting for them on an elephant's back,
Heros takes his beloved away to his castle.
Meanwhile, Cervus, who saw everything on the opposite shore,
at first does not dare to jump into the water,
then in a fit of despair he jumps anyway and...
Oh, what indignity!
Catching his clothes on the branch of a tree,
he remains hanging from it, flailing his arms and legs helplessly.
The next day, Cervus decides to issue an ultimatum to his foe with the stipulation
that if within 24 hours Lucanida is not returned,
he will declare a terrible and merciless war on all the Whiskered.
Nevertheless, Heros, after reading this missive,
angrily tears it up and expels the ambassador.
When Cervus finds out how Heros treated his ambassador,
he orders his army to march against the enemy.
At the sight of the approaching enemy,
an alarm is raised on the walls of Heros's castle.
Here the first shrapnel explodes, followed by another.
Soon, a whole sea of salvos rises.
The Horned roll a siege-gun up to the castle,
climb it, and lower the drawbridge.
A hand-to-hand melee breaks out, during which Cervus gets to the castle wall.
Heros heroically defends himself.
And now he sees his implacable enemy.
Heros sees that the Whiskered cannot win
and decides to die a valiant death.
He slams the door of the castle behind him, and runs downstairs,
where his faithful Lucanida awaits him.
"My sweetheart,
my beautiful Lucanida," he says,
"we cannot be saved.
Cervus will be bursting into the tower any minute.
Do you want to die with me?"
And Lucanida is quick to say: "Yes."
At that moment, as the tower door falls under the pressure,
and Cervus himself bursts in, waving an exposed sword,
Heros grabs Lucanida in his arms and lights the gunpowder he had prepared.
A terrible explosion follows.
Towers, walls and the whole castle collapse.
Cervus and his army die in the explosion.
In the afterlife, in the realm of eternal bliss,
Heros and Lucanida finally find peace.
They fall into a rose flower cup,
its petals covering them,
to the wonderful sounds of a song.
The song of a love that prevailed.
The Beautiful Lucanida,
or The Battle of the Horned and the Whiskered.
A Ladislas Starevich film
Reconstructed by Nikolai Izvolov
Read by Alexander Negreba
Music: "Valse Sentimentale" by P.I. Tchaikovsky
Source materials scanning: Vladimir Kotovsky
Restoration: Nikolai Mayorov
THE END (subs: easierwithpractice & Niffiwan)