Cinema: Censors' Day Off

As audiences cheer, filmmakers are ushering a May Day parade of social ills -- and a little sex -- onto the screen

Start with the happy ending. Like a song escaping from jaws long wired shut, the political voice of Soviet films is suddenly loud and clear. Did we say loud? Listen to the rock music that carpets the sound tracks. It drowns out everything but the angry shouts of the teen heroes, who sleep around and do drugs while aiming to be an amalgam of Elvis and Che. The revealing documentary Is It Easy to Be Young? portrays a generation given to graffiti and hooliganism. "I don't think about what will happen to me," says one young man, spiked hair framing a...

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