PM Review

Eisenstein’s first feature film starts with a walkout in “Strike” [1925] which had been followed by a mutiny in “Battleship Potemkin” [1925] and he broadened his horizon in “October”  [1928] that dealt with revolution. As if he had developed the themes of the cinemas organically.   The scene of raising the bridge to separate the center from the working class, hanging a horse on one side & a woman on the other are just majestic.   The use of rhythmic montage followed with intellectual montage using religious deities and political persona are one of the most ambiguous depictions Eisenstein created with his artistry.    The overtonal montages of dancing soldiers and broken deities and hiding statesmen felt a bit overly repetitive but deeply suspenseful.   Repetitive shallow depth of field, extreme close up shot, long and wide over head shots, high angled and low angled shots, dissolves and cross cutting are used in the film with artistry that make a deep e...

Is Eisenstein’s Battleship Potemkin [1925] the first film I have ever watched where the narrative structure has been followed mechanically by the theatrical form of drama, [five acts structure]? Maybe it was his first step to be formalistic in film making before imposing artistic principles on firm technical elements of film. I sometimes fall into a muddle thinking that can any medium of art carry the innate meaning and create value only based on its form without the author’s intentions and cultural stimulations. Eisenstein attempted his highest to be focused deeply on the film's formal signature but the narrative structure could not get rid of from its critical basis, the mutiny in 1905 in a Russian naval battle ship that was worked as one of the catalysts for Russian revolution in 1917. The Bengal mutiny in 1857 had also been a significant catalyst for the independence around the Indian subcontinent in 1947.   Though I have no wide-ranging knowledge about Marxism except Hegel’s h...