Lettre d'un Russe en Corse
Letter From Corsica
Tania Rakhmanova
2007 - 54 min - Beta digital - Couleur - France

150,000 Russian refugees fled the Bolshevik Revolution to Constantinople. 300 started a new family line in Corsica fifteen years later. An authentic human saga took place in the 20s. The story of these Russians in Corsica, a good example of integration in a single generation, is the theme of this documentary.
The film takes the form of an imaginary letter from a Russian living in Corsica. Using archive footage, personal documents and interviews with descendants of the steamship Rion, it relates the fate of these Russian refugees. On May 15, 1921, they arrived in Ajaccio on the Rion, a rusty tub of a steamship. There were 3,700 on board. At sea, they had suffered hunger, thirst and a journey worthy of the Exodus. In the harbour, they were placed in quarantine, and remained destitute and hungry. Thus began the story of the Russians in Corsica.