The Great Consoler (1933) review

"Biopic" (quotation marks necessary) of American writer William Porter (Konstantin Khokhlov) - known by all as O. Henry - shows him serving his sentence (and drinking hard) in Ohio Penitentiary (for embezzlement) and getting asked by the Warden (Vasili Kovrigin) to convince fellow inmate James Valentine (Ivan Novoseltsev) to crack a safe ... and then it transforms into a silent film ... and then there's a shopgirl named Dulcie (Aleksandra Khokhlova) who loves to read his stories.  While it is curious to see a Soviet director like Kuleshov take interest in a Westerner (he clearly admires him), the execution is downright baffling as it shifts rapidly (and often unexpectedly) from segment to segment but never finds a way to bring them together. I think it's supposed to show how "real life" influences and gets transformed by the creative process ... but I'm not sure about that either.  It might be best thought of as a traditional narrative that slipped on a wet blini, cracked its head and became an experiment....