On Distant Shores

On distant shores
Directed by	Tofig Taghizade
Starring	Nodar Shashigoglu Yury Bogolyubov
Cinematography	Alisattar Atakishiyev
Music by	Gara Garayev
Running time	89 minutes
Country	Soviet Union
Language	Azerbaijani

On distant shores (Template:Lang-az) is a full-length Azerbaijani war film. Co-written by Imran Gasimov, Hasan Seyidbeyli, directed by Tofig Taghizade, the film portrays the life of the legendary Azerbaijani guerilla of the Second World War Mehdi Huseynzade, who fought the Nazi forces in the present-day Italy and Slovenia, hence the film`s name On distant shores referring to the Adriatic Sea.

Plot

Mehdi Huseynzade aka Mihajlo is the most wanted guerilla in Yugoslavia and Trieste. Disguised as a Wehrmacht officer, Mehdi plots and successfully performs a terror act in a restaurant full of German officers. However, he is wounded by a spy (Carranti) infiltrated in the guerilla forces. While recovering Mehdi is out of operations for a while. He occasionally paints and daydreams of returning to his native Baku after the war. While the Germans increase the award for Mihajlo, he carries out another daring operation on getting food supply from a wealthy Italian businessman for partisans.

Mihajlo usually plans and carries out his operations with his brother-in-arm Veselin and a young girl named Anzhelika. The three are parts of a love triangle at the same time. Veselin loves Anzhelika, while she has a crush on Mihajlo. The latter also has some feelings to Anzhelika, but concentrates his attention on operations.

During the next operation Anzhelika is detained by the Germans, but she still manages to pass the necessary information to Mihajlo and Veselin. Thanks to the information, the two successfully accomplish the mission of exploding a movie theater and killing hundreds of German officers and escape from the chasing soldiers.

While the Germans start a massive search of Mihajlo, he encounters with Major Schulz, who is suspicious and about to detain him. However, claiming to be a poor, half-German, half-French painter by name Auguste Kraus, Mihajlo demonstrates his painting skills by creating a Schulz portrait. Believing that he is a painter, not guerrilla, Schulz has no choice, but let Mihajlo go. But when leaving Schulz`s office, Mihajlo met Veselin, and the two make nearby soldiers suspicious. Mortally wounded, Veselin dies in Mihajlo`s hands.

Back in the guerrilla camp, Mihajlo receives bad news: Anzhelika was also murdered. The revenge of outrageous Mihajlo turns to be costly for the Germans, as he explodes several hotels and facilities.

Mihajlo then finds Carranti and kills him before he manages to escape with a suitcase of money. Chased by the German soldiers, Mihajlo arrives in a village, where Veselin`s father dwells. The Germans led by Schulz also come to the village and demand the local population reveal Mihajlo`s whereabouts. While the locals do not betray him, Mihajlo does not want to put their lives under risk either. He leaves the house of Veselin`s father and appears in front of Schulz, who to his horror realizes Mihajlo and Kraus are the same person. Mihajlo manages to murder Schulz but gets shot by the German soldiers. Again daydreaming of returning Baku in his last breathe, Mihajlo falls down, but the activated bomb on him explodes and kills the approaching soldiers.

Cast

• Nodar Shashigoglu as Mehdi Huseynzade (Mihajlo)
• Yury Bogolyubov as Veselin
• Aydar Yelikoyeva as Anzhelika
• Alasgar Alakbarov as Ferrero
• Lev Bordukov as Carranti
• Andrei Fajt as Maselli

External links

• On distant shores (Russian)
• Youtube: On distant shores (Azerbaijani)