Collective Existence in Samson Samsonov’s Film 'Odinokim predostavlyaetsya obshchezhitie' (Dormitory for Singles)

The article provides a study of the features of the style and character system in Samson Samsonov’s film Dormitory for Singles (1983). An important aspect of the study is the problem of “collective existence”, which is analyzed by the author in a complex way — as a motive, as an element of creating a narrative of the 1980s Soviet comedy, etc. The author associates the filmmakers’ use of another essential concept — irony, starting from the 1970s, with the increasing role of moral issues, while collective existence allows film directors to use the comedy genre as an effective tool for criticizing contemporary culture and society. In the film Dormitory for Singles, irony is present at all levels: verbal, dramatic and authorial. It can also be noted that Samsonov uses irony in order to give a new meaning to the genre of production drama, which can be attributed to the author’s message. The director scrupulously builds a conditional space — the image of an ideal world, an ideal dormitory, in which many visitors from different parts of the then huge country would be eager to live. The author identifies the techniques by which a team of workers of a weaving factory appears on the screen as a close-knit family and defines strategies for constructing a space of collective existence associated with home comfort, and trust-based human relationships. The conclusions drawn by the author make it possible to systematize the idea of effective strategies for the representation of the working team in the Soviet melodrama genre.