Heart of a Dog

Heart of a Dog (Sobachye serdtse, 1988) is a Soviet adaptation of Mikhail Bulgakov's satire that you can watch online on iFILM. Moscow, the mid-1920s. A celebrated surgeon, Professor Preobrazhensky, brings a half-frozen stray into his apartment and grafts a human pituitary gland onto the animal.

The procedure works far too well. The dog turns into a man who takes the name Sharikov, demands a residence permit, hits the bottle, and quickly learns to weaponize the slogans of the new proletarian order. He bonds with the building committee, files complaints against the professor who made him, and turns a refined household into a battlefield. Yevgeny Yevstigneyev plays the exasperated professor; Vladimir Tolokonnikov, as Sharikov, steals every scene he is in.

Director Vladimir Bortko shot the film in sepia tones that mimic old newsreels, and Bulgakov's mockery of early Soviet life reaches the screen intact. Plenty of its lines became everyday Russian quotations. It is one of those rare adaptations that overshadow the book itself. Stream Heart of a Dog (1988) online on iFILM.