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Alexander Nevsky (1938)

Posted on November 27, 2013 | Leave a comment

Alexander Nevsky

Directed by Sergei M. Eisenstein and Dmitri Vasilyev
Written by Sergei M. Eisenstein and Pyotr Pavlenko
USSR/1938
Mosfilm
Repeat viewing

[box] Alexandr Nevsky: Go tell all in foreign lands that Russia lives! Those who come to us in peace will be welcome as a guest. But those who come to us sword in hand will die by the sword! On that Russia stands and forever will we stand![/box]

My appreciation of this film took a nose dive due to the substandard print and sound track on the rental DVD I received. I rated it very highly when viewed in a restored print.

The story is based on the historical Prince Alexander (1220-1263) who defeated an army of Teutonic Knights of the Holy Roman Empire who were invading Novgorod.

Most of Russia, save Novgorod, has fallen to the Mongol Horde. The people call on Alexander, who had previously defeated a Swedish invasion, to free Russia of the Mongol yoke. Alexander declines, saying that the real threat will come from Germany. Soon enough, the Teutonic Knights have defeated the city of Pskov, massacring its civilian population (and throwing babies into bonfires).

The people beg Alexander to lead them against the foe and he arrives in Novgorod, where the nobility and merchants desert the town. The common people, including woman warrior Vasilisa, bravely fight the Huns on frozen Lake Peipus. The Germans are roundly defeated and their clergy crushed. The people take pity on captured German foot soldiers but have no mercy for Russian traitors.

The main attractions of Eisenstein’s film are the magnificent Prokofiev score and the masterfully edited and shot battle sequences. These were obscured by a blurry print and a tinny, static-fillied soundtrack in the version I watched. In addition, the subtitles made the characters sound like medieval Yodas. I can recommend the Criterion Collection version and I am sure there are other good restored prints out there.

The film was a great success on its 1938 release. In 1939, it was withdrawn from circulation when Stalin entered the Ribbentrop-Molotov pact with Hitler. Following the Nazi invasion of the USSR in 1941, it was rapidly returned to Soviet screens. Eisenstein was awarded the Stalin Prize for the film the same year.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKZPgGbUuX0

Clip – Battle on the Ice (beautiful sound)

Battleship Potemkin (1925)

Posted on April 30, 2013 | 4 comments

Battleship Potemkin (“Bronenosets Potyomkin”)
Directed by Sergei M. Eisenstein
1925/USSR
Goskino
Repeat viewing
#27 of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die

Opening Intertitle: Revolution is war. Of all the wars known in history it is the only lawful, rightful, just, and great war. . . In Russia this war has been declared and begun – Lenin, 1905.

The sailors of the Battleship Potemkin are fed up with their diet of rotten, maggoty meat and refuse to eat their borscht. The officers threaten to kill them for insubordination and the sailors revolt. The citizens of Odessa rise up in support of the rebel sailors and are slaughtered on the Odessa steps by tsarist soldiers. The rest of the squadron closes in on the Potemkin and the crew gets ready to fight. At the last minute, victory! The sailors on the other ships allow the Potemkin to pass safely.

Battleship Potemkin 1

While this movie does not exactly make my heart sing, there is no arguing that it taught the world a lot about how to tell a story and manipulate audience emotions through editing. The famous Odessa steps sequence is still one of the most powerfully horrific scenes in film history. This time around I noticed some pretty exquisite cinematography in this film at well. The restored print brought out the ethereal ships in the harbor when Vakulinchuk’s body is brought by boat to the docks at dawn. The sequence of the fleet of little sailing boats taking provisions to the battleship is also lyrical and quite lovely. It is easy to forget such interludes in a film that seems to determined to brand shocking images on the brain.