Battleship Potemkin (1/14/19)
Pre-Review Notes
This is my third time watching this film in its entirety and I would just like to bring up the soundtrack and the translation as the two previous times that I had watched it in my film courses in high school, there was a different soundtrack it was a lot more minimal. There weren't the blaring trumpets at the end building the tension, there wasn't the added sound effects of whistles and piano hits, and there was no music during the famous Odessa Steps sequence. Also along with that the titles of the five parts were translated differently. I remember it was "Men and Worms" and "The Odessa Steps" instead of "People and Worms" and the "Odessa Staircase", some other scenes were differently translated too. The difference in translations mainly made this film a little less brash and bold as compared to the one I watched previously however there was an inverse effect with the music. This viewings music was loud and fast and over the top, my viewing was nearly silent. I am not sure which I prefer. All I know for sure is I think the music could have been left out of the Odessa Steps scene, there is just as much emotion and impact without it if not more. I feel this because it isn't distracting having the orchestra trying to make you feel one way when you clearly know you should be feeling that way. The ending's raised tension from the music also in my opinion could be taken away as the ending is somewhat anti-climactic, and the loud music and trumpet blaring kind of made it feel more so. However on my third viewing I still enjoyed it and I really liked the addition of the added sound effects from the orchestra, those were fun and I wasn't expecting them. I'm glad they were sparsely used and realistic though because it could have gotten annoying.
Battleship Potemkin
Right from the start this film is anything but subtle. Big block letters announce the plot of the film. Short phrases pop on screen in dramatic ways to show the speaking and the action. They do not interrupt and slow the pace of the film they appear as fast blasts of language in an otherwise silent film. It is a big change from the previous films we viewed and a big change for silent films in general. This film was stylized and bold. Rapid cuts and chaotic movement filling every shot are highlights of some of the changes from other silent films. This film while Soviet, was far more "American" than the previous films. It is fast, it is loud, and bold, this is very much due to the fact that Sergei Eisenstein's landmark editing of "The Odessa Steps" sequence shaped the way that films are editing. His use of condensing and expanding "filmic" time is unprecedented. The montage of violent and frantic imagery and the waves of people pouring down the steps is an inspiration for films to come. His editing techniques are masterful and they have really survived time. Various sequences in this film (with color and sound) could easily fit into a movie today. The techniques are modernized and the style is a bit more American making it an incredibly important film for everyone.
Not only is the way the film presents itself not subtle, the themes are metaphors are pretty direct as well. The whiny, old, frail, captain hitting the "young man" sleeping in the bunks occupied by dozens of young, muscular men. All the captains are very clearly physically weak compared to the masses of the sailors. One captain is about four feet tall, another a little bit on the obese side, another one looks to be like he's nearing 70. While all the sailors are these strapping, young, muscular men full of rebellious energy. As this film is a propaganda film made in the Soviet Era, this makes sense why they would present the working class like this. It's a great image to encourage the proletariat and poke fun at the bourgeois. From the early abuses of the crew and the obvious physical differences between the various ranks on the ship, another very obvious theme begins to pop up and that is the disregard for religion. From the smashing of the plate containing portions of a christian prayer to the assault of "the pope" and the exclamation "Be gone Sorcerer". Again this attitude makes sense for the Soviet Era, as they were trying to create and Atheist state. Showing the proletariat destroy religious icons and then triumph over there oppressors is a very heavy handed propaganda tactic.
Heavy handedness and obvious symbolism is not a bad thing and I think the fact that most of the main themes in this film are handled this way makes it just sort of fit into the style of the movie. If only the physical differences between the ranks of the sailors was made obvious and everything was to be inferred or was deliberately vague, it'd make the brazen metaphor seem lazy or like a mistake. But the powerful, up front nature of every theme in this film makes it a powerful propaganda film and it makes for a very interesting style that is not scene much anymore in my opinion. There are very films who can sort of scream in your face the way this one does, and even if there is they rarely hold it for the entire run time as Battleship Potemkin does.
Moving on to past the uprising of the sailors and onto the shores of Odessa, I was just blown away by the crowds of people depicted in this film. The rows and waves of bodies moving through the streets and down the stairs of Odessa, around the bending bridge on the Black Sea, just filling up every inch of the screen was really something that I can truly say I have never seen before. I think that even if I have seen it in a film today it is not nearly as impressive as it almost certain that the back rows of people in crowds in modern films are computer generated. Here every person we see on screen is alive and real and in the same place as all these other masses. It was really incredible. The progression on the faces of the rebellious in the crowd was very interesting to watch. The faces turned from a sadness to an anger and then to a fear as the military came marching down the steps to meet them. It was a very moving series of events and the pace of the editing allowed us to feel along with them from the sadness, the mourning waves of pilgrims going to pay tribute to their martyr, the women crying on his chest, the men solemnly removing their caps to honor the man who dies "all for a spoon of borscht". Turned to motivation, and anger, the clenching fists of all the Russians, the five pointed star emblazoned on their flag. Turned finally to fear and sadness, as their dreams get trampled and shot down along with their bodies.
The turning point from motivation to fear was the massacre on the Odessa Steps. We talked about this scene so much in my previous film classes and the thing that always sticks out to me is the diversity in the crowd. People of all shapes and sizes come out to protest. We see old women, handicapped, men, children all come out to honor the battleship. In contrast the military is all the same, a wall of faceless bodies shooting at this beautiful, diverse crowd without remorse. We see the faces of all those being oppressed, trampled, and killed, but we do not see one close up of the oppressors. Mostly we see their backs, with a hulking black statue beckoning them forward, almost giving them orders. The final shot of this sequence of the woman screaming with blood running down her face also sticks in my mind for hours after viewing.
One final thing I noticed on this viewing was a few sexually charged scenes that seemed a little bit misplaced in the whole of the picture. Of course with a ship full of strong young men there is bound to be some phallic imagery of sexual scenes. It is, after all, a whole boatload of testosterone. There were a number of scenes inter-cut with the men cooking on the swaying tables, of sailors cleaning the guns and gears of the ships. One man straddled a cannon and pushed a large fluffy rod into it causing the whole to drip some sort of liquid down its face. He continued to push it in and out, while at the same time it appeared some men were buffing out some other mechanical bits or cannons underneath the deck. However it kind of looked like they were pleasuring them. This was all followed by the execution scene on deck where there were very few shots where the enormous, phallic turrets were not in the forefront of the frame or at the very least, taking up some real estate in the corner. Phallic means power in most films and this is the scene where power is proven and then changes hands. I would have not mentioned these scenes sticking out to me, but in class it was said that the Russians really like Freud, and the masturbation of large mechanical guns by strapping young men is something that he would be very interested in.
This is my third time watching this film in its entirety and I would just like to bring up the soundtrack and the translation as the two previous times that I had watched it in my film courses in high school, there was a different soundtrack it was a lot more minimal. There weren't the blaring trumpets at the end building the tension, there wasn't the added sound effects of whistles and piano hits, and there was no music during the famous Odessa Steps sequence. Also along with that the titles of the five parts were translated differently. I remember it was "Men and Worms" and "The Odessa Steps" instead of "People and Worms" and the "Odessa Staircase", some other scenes were differently translated too. The difference in translations mainly made this film a little less brash and bold as compared to the one I watched previously however there was an inverse effect with the music. This viewings music was loud and fast and over the top, my viewing was nearly silent. I am not sure which I prefer. All I know for sure is I think the music could have been left out of the Odessa Steps scene, there is just as much emotion and impact without it if not more. I feel this because it isn't distracting having the orchestra trying to make you feel one way when you clearly know you should be feeling that way. The ending's raised tension from the music also in my opinion could be taken away as the ending is somewhat anti-climactic, and the loud music and trumpet blaring kind of made it feel more so. However on my third viewing I still enjoyed it and I really liked the addition of the added sound effects from the orchestra, those were fun and I wasn't expecting them. I'm glad they were sparsely used and realistic though because it could have gotten annoying.
Battleship Potemkin
Right from the start this film is anything but subtle. Big block letters announce the plot of the film. Short phrases pop on screen in dramatic ways to show the speaking and the action. They do not interrupt and slow the pace of the film they appear as fast blasts of language in an otherwise silent film. It is a big change from the previous films we viewed and a big change for silent films in general. This film was stylized and bold. Rapid cuts and chaotic movement filling every shot are highlights of some of the changes from other silent films. This film while Soviet, was far more "American" than the previous films. It is fast, it is loud, and bold, this is very much due to the fact that Sergei Eisenstein's landmark editing of "The Odessa Steps" sequence shaped the way that films are editing. His use of condensing and expanding "filmic" time is unprecedented. The montage of violent and frantic imagery and the waves of people pouring down the steps is an inspiration for films to come. His editing techniques are masterful and they have really survived time. Various sequences in this film (with color and sound) could easily fit into a movie today. The techniques are modernized and the style is a bit more American making it an incredibly important film for everyone.
Not only is the way the film presents itself not subtle, the themes are metaphors are pretty direct as well. The whiny, old, frail, captain hitting the "young man" sleeping in the bunks occupied by dozens of young, muscular men. All the captains are very clearly physically weak compared to the masses of the sailors. One captain is about four feet tall, another a little bit on the obese side, another one looks to be like he's nearing 70. While all the sailors are these strapping, young, muscular men full of rebellious energy. As this film is a propaganda film made in the Soviet Era, this makes sense why they would present the working class like this. It's a great image to encourage the proletariat and poke fun at the bourgeois. From the early abuses of the crew and the obvious physical differences between the various ranks on the ship, another very obvious theme begins to pop up and that is the disregard for religion. From the smashing of the plate containing portions of a christian prayer to the assault of "the pope" and the exclamation "Be gone Sorcerer". Again this attitude makes sense for the Soviet Era, as they were trying to create and Atheist state. Showing the proletariat destroy religious icons and then triumph over there oppressors is a very heavy handed propaganda tactic.
Heavy handedness and obvious symbolism is not a bad thing and I think the fact that most of the main themes in this film are handled this way makes it just sort of fit into the style of the movie. If only the physical differences between the ranks of the sailors was made obvious and everything was to be inferred or was deliberately vague, it'd make the brazen metaphor seem lazy or like a mistake. But the powerful, up front nature of every theme in this film makes it a powerful propaganda film and it makes for a very interesting style that is not scene much anymore in my opinion. There are very films who can sort of scream in your face the way this one does, and even if there is they rarely hold it for the entire run time as Battleship Potemkin does.
Moving on to past the uprising of the sailors and onto the shores of Odessa, I was just blown away by the crowds of people depicted in this film. The rows and waves of bodies moving through the streets and down the stairs of Odessa, around the bending bridge on the Black Sea, just filling up every inch of the screen was really something that I can truly say I have never seen before. I think that even if I have seen it in a film today it is not nearly as impressive as it almost certain that the back rows of people in crowds in modern films are computer generated. Here every person we see on screen is alive and real and in the same place as all these other masses. It was really incredible. The progression on the faces of the rebellious in the crowd was very interesting to watch. The faces turned from a sadness to an anger and then to a fear as the military came marching down the steps to meet them. It was a very moving series of events and the pace of the editing allowed us to feel along with them from the sadness, the mourning waves of pilgrims going to pay tribute to their martyr, the women crying on his chest, the men solemnly removing their caps to honor the man who dies "all for a spoon of borscht". Turned to motivation, and anger, the clenching fists of all the Russians, the five pointed star emblazoned on their flag. Turned finally to fear and sadness, as their dreams get trampled and shot down along with their bodies.
The turning point from motivation to fear was the massacre on the Odessa Steps. We talked about this scene so much in my previous film classes and the thing that always sticks out to me is the diversity in the crowd. People of all shapes and sizes come out to protest. We see old women, handicapped, men, children all come out to honor the battleship. In contrast the military is all the same, a wall of faceless bodies shooting at this beautiful, diverse crowd without remorse. We see the faces of all those being oppressed, trampled, and killed, but we do not see one close up of the oppressors. Mostly we see their backs, with a hulking black statue beckoning them forward, almost giving them orders. The final shot of this sequence of the woman screaming with blood running down her face also sticks in my mind for hours after viewing.
One final thing I noticed on this viewing was a few sexually charged scenes that seemed a little bit misplaced in the whole of the picture. Of course with a ship full of strong young men there is bound to be some phallic imagery of sexual scenes. It is, after all, a whole boatload of testosterone. There were a number of scenes inter-cut with the men cooking on the swaying tables, of sailors cleaning the guns and gears of the ships. One man straddled a cannon and pushed a large fluffy rod into it causing the whole to drip some sort of liquid down its face. He continued to push it in and out, while at the same time it appeared some men were buffing out some other mechanical bits or cannons underneath the deck. However it kind of looked like they were pleasuring them. This was all followed by the execution scene on deck where there were very few shots where the enormous, phallic turrets were not in the forefront of the frame or at the very least, taking up some real estate in the corner. Phallic means power in most films and this is the scene where power is proven and then changes hands. I would have not mentioned these scenes sticking out to me, but in class it was said that the Russians really like Freud, and the masturbation of large mechanical guns by strapping young men is something that he would be very interested in.
I like what you've said about the music during the Odessa Staircase scene. I think silence during that scene may be able to add emotion and realness in the way that a lack of color may add to a scene. I had not noticed the physical differences between the officers and sailors but the imagery is definitely there.
ReplyDeleteI think the staircase scene works both with and without music however it is already so jarring and powerful I think less is more in terms of music for that scene.
DeleteThat's awesome that you've seen this movie a couple times before and were able to pick up on some differences while watching it a third time. Really unique perspective from some of the blog posts I've read so far. Very interesting!
ReplyDelete