rating:
(out of
4 stars)Soviet Union; 1925
Directed by Sergei M. Eisenstein; produced by Jacob Bliokh; written by Sergei M. Eisenstein, Nina Agadzhanova
Starring Aleksandr Antonov, Vladimir Barsky, Grigori Aleksandrov, Ivan Bobrov, Mikhail Gomorov, Aleksandr Levshin
Below you will find a temporary review for this film. The real (better, more complete) review will be online very soon.
There is something special about watching the really old films, especially
when it is a film as influential as 'Bronenosets Potyomkin' ('The Battleship
Potemkin'). Besides the historical value of the film I was surprised how
much I really enjoyed it. Director Sergei Eisenstein takes reel events and
changes them a little for this powerful film.
The story begins on the battleship Potemkin where the men are served rotten
meat. A sailor named Vakulinchuk (Aleksandr Antonov) steps up and after a
series of events mutiny is what follows. Out of revenge an officer is able
to kill Vakulinchuk. The men on the ship want to honor him and try to bring
their revolution to the shore, to the city of Odessa. They place him in the
harbor in a tent with a sign that says he was killed over a boil of soup.
The people of Odessa sympathize with the sailors from the Potemkin and they
are welcomed in their city. A massacre, in one of the most famous sequences
of the cinema, is what follows on the Odessa Staircase.
It is especially this great sequence that shows some real horrors,
uncompromising I should add. There are images, like the slit eyeball from
'Un Chien Andalou', you will remember. The people on the staircase, troops
firing at them, a crushed hand, a woman with her child shot dead, but most
of all a carriage with a baby in it, rolling down the staircase. Every image
is effective, showing things what few (or no) films did back then. I was
amazed of how good this scene still works today; I was watching in
disbelieve.
On a technical scale the film is also very good. Most of the time we believe
we are watching what the film wants us to see, the visuals work. Eisenstein
is able to make things even more effective the way he cuts between the
images. Famous for its montage, 'Bronenosets Potyomkin' sometimes seems like
a choreographed sequence of presented images, with a rhythm and a tempo. I
could say so much more about this film, one you should have seen if you are
interested in the history of the cinema. If you do not really care you might
give it a chance. It is one of the most effective silent films I can think
of, still very accessible for a large audience.