Червона Рута

In 1971, director Roman Oleksiv directed Ukrtelefilm in the town of Yaremchi in the Carpathians and shot a musical film based on the script by Myroslav Skochylas about the tender and pure love of a girl from the Highlands and a boy from Donetsk called "Chervona Ruta". Roman Oleksiv set himself a difficult task: to affirm the beauty of human life through the nobility of the relationships of modern youth, endowed with high feelings expressed in songs. In addition to the lyrical charm of the songs, the feelings of the young heroes of the work are enhanced by the poetics of the surrounding world, the attractiveness of the landscape. Roman approached this picture with acquired experience, his good taste did not fail: he avoided screen clichés and created complete harmony between the characters of the film, their songs and the natural background against which the events unfold. Songs by Volodymyr Ivasyuk and other authors were performed by Vasyl Zinkevich, Nazarii Yaremchuk, Sofia Rotar and others. Rotar and Zinkevich became the main characters. It was the first Ukrainian musical film, it was a great success. After it was shown on the screens, "Smerichka" became the best group in the USSR, and its soloists became people's favorites. Sofia Rotar also brought real great success to the shooting. The film had its own plot line: on the train "Donetsk - Verkhovyna" (in fact, such a train could not exist in nature, since the village of Verkhovyna is located 31 km from the nearest railway station Vorokhty), the Carpathian mountain beauty Oksana and the young miner Boris (in the role of Oksana - the teacher of the Chernivtsi Music School, Sofya Rotar - then still without the "u" in the ending, this is how it is recorded in credits, - Boris is played by Vasyl Zinkevich, the soloist of Levko Dutkovsky's "Smerichka". According to the script, the main characters were supposed to sing the song "Vodogray" together. But they could not sing it and record it in a duet. That is why the film features the performance of Nazariy Yaremchuk with Maria Isak, although Vasyl and Sofia are in the frame. Especially for the film, Lviv poet Roman Kudlyk wrote the Ukrainian text of the Italian song by Don Bacchi and Mariano Detto (in the original version of "L'immensita" - "Immensity"). In Ukrainian, it is called "White-winged Bird", and it became a cult in the repertoire of Sofia Rotaru throughout her creative career.