The Twelve Months (1956 film)

The Twelve Months
Original Russian poster
Directed by	Ivan Ivanov-Vano Mikhail Botov
Produced by	Ivan Ivanov-Vano
Written by	Samuil Marshak Nikolay Erdman
Music by	Moisey Vaynberg
Release date	1956 (USSR)
Running time	56 minutes
Country	Soviet Union
Language	Russian

The Twelve Months (Russian: Двенадцать месяцев; Dvenadtsat mesyatsev) is a 1956 Soviet traditionally animated feature film directed by the "patriarch of Russian animation", Ivan Ivanov-Vano. It was produced at the Soyuzmultfilm studio in Moscow and is based on the fairy-tale play of the same name by Samuil Marshak.

The film's sound and image were restored in 2003 by Krupnyy Plan, who released it on video and DVD in Russia in 2004. An English-subtitled edition of the Russian-language version has not been released. However, Films by Jove released the film on DVD in 1999 as "volume 3" of its "Stories From My Childhood" series - this version features a choice of English, French or Spanish soundtracks.

The scene of action in the animated film isn't specified, but on a picture it is clear that action happens in the West (in the original of the story of Marshak — in Bohemia, then part of the Austrian empire) at the turn of the eighteenth to nineteenth centuries. The animated film plot quite precisely reflects story events, thus the particular emphasis is placed on ridicule of shortcomings of an absolute monarchy.

Professor teaches the capricious girl queen is semiliterate, bratty, and does not wish to be taught. When the lesson turns to botany, she wishes that April will arrive tomorrow, and bring with it the spring flowers, Snowdrops. The professor assures her that this is impossible, since it is the dead of winter, however the queen issues the decree: whoever brings a basket of these flowers to the palace, will receive the same basket of gold and a fur coat.

A poor country stepmother and her daughter dream of this reward and as soon as the stepdaughter with comes back home after gathering brushwood, they send her back to the wood — to carry out the royal will and gather the impossible Snowdrops.

The freezing stepdaughter comes to a glade in which a fire burns, and round it the twelve brother Months are heated. They listen carefully to the girl, and April asks his brothers to concede to him an hour or so to help her. She comes back home happy with snowdrops and a magic ring presented to her by April. If there is trouble, she can throw the ringlet and speak the magic words — and all twelve brother months will come to her rescue.