The Battleship Potemkin

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For the real-life battleship, see Russian battleship Potemkin.

The Battleship Potemkin
Image:Vintage Potemkin.jpg
Directed by	Sergei M. Eisenstein
Produced by	Jacob Bliokh
Written by	Nina Agadzhanova Nikolai Aseyev Sergei M. Eisenstein Sergei Tretyakov
Distributed by	Goskino
Release date(s)	Image:Flag of the Soviet Union.svg December 21 1925 Image:Flag of France.svg November 12 1926
Running time	75 min.
Language	Russian
IMDb profile

The Battleship Potemkin (Russian: Броненосец «Потёмкин», Bronenosets Potyomkin), sometimes The Battleship Potyomkin, is a 1925 silent film directed by Sergei Eisenstein and produced by Mosfilm. It is a fictional narrative film meant to glorify a real-life event that occurred in 1905, the Battleship Potemkin uprising, when the crew of a Russian battleship rebelled against their oppressive officers during the Tsarist regime. Potemkin has been called one of the most influential films of all time, and it was named the greatest film of all time at the World's Fair at Brussels, Belgium, in 1958.

1 Film style and content
- 1.1 The Odessa Steps sequence
2 Previous censorship and recent restoration
3 Legacy
4 See also
5 Notes
6 External links

[edit] Film style and content

Deliberately written as a revolutionary propaganda film, Eisenstein used this film to test his theories of "montage". The revolutionary Soviet filmmakers of the Kuleshov school of filmmaking were experimenting with the effect of films on the audience, and Eisenstein edited the film in a way that would produce the greatest emotional response, so that the viewer would feel sympathy for the rebellious sailors of the battleship Potemkin and hatred for their cruel overlords. In the manner of most propaganda, the story was written in a very simplistic fashion, so that the audience could clearly see whom they could sympathize with.

Image:Bronenosets Rodchenko.jpg

Eisenstein's experiment was a mixed success and at the time Potemkin was not a hit with Soviet audiences.<ref>Neuberger, Joan (2003). Ivan the Terrible. New York: I.B. Tauris & Co. Ltd.. "[Eisenstein] was disappointed when Potemkin failed to attract masses of viewers."</ref> It was also released in a number of venues around the world, where audiences responded positively. Although, in both Soviet Union and overseas, the film also shocked audiences not because of its political statements, but because its use of violence, which was considered graphic by the standards of the time. Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels called Potemkin "a marvellous film without equal in the cinema ... anyone who had no firm political conviction could become a Bolshevik after seeing the film."<ref name = "ht"> Triumph of the Will. www.historytoday.com. Retrieved on 2006-07-30. </ref>

The film was composed of five episodes: "People and Worms" (Люди и черви), "Drama at the Harbor" (Драма на тендре), "The Dead Man is Appealing" (Мёртвый взывает), "The Odessa Staircase" (Одесская лестница), and "The Rendez-Vous with a Squadron" (Встреча с эскадрой).

[edit] The Odessa Steps sequence

The most famous scene from the film is the massacre on the Odessa Steps (Primorsky or Potemkin Stairs). In the scene, the Tsar's Cossacks in their white summer tunics march down a seemingly endless flight of stairs in a rhythmic, machine-like fashion, slaughtering a crowd of civilians as they attempt to flee down the stairs before the troops reach them. Toward the end of the sequence, the troops shoot a mother pushing a baby carriage. She falls to the ground, and as she dies she accidentally kicks the carriage away; it rolls down the stairs alongside the frightened crowd.

The scene was perhaps the best example of Eisenstein's theory on montage, and ironically may have influenced many of Leni Riefenstahl's similar images in Triumph of the Will. It has been endlessly referenced in many motion pictures, with famous homages occurring in Francis Ford Coppola's The Godfather, Brian De Palma's version of The Untouchables, and Star Wars Episode III - Revenge of the Sith (except the troopers marched up the stairs). It was also spoofed in Woody Allen's Bananas and Love and Death, Terry Gilliam's Brazil, Naked Gun: 33 1/3 and the anime series Ergo Proxy. There was even a runaway baby carriage in Ghostbusters 2.

There were widespread demonstrations in the area, sparked off by the arrival of the Potemkin in Odessa Harbour, and both the London Times and the resident British Consul reported that troops did fire on the crowds with accompanying loss of life. However the portrayed massacre on the steps is fictional, presumably created by Eisenstein for its dramatic venue and effect. <ref>Fabe, Marilyn (Aug 1, 2004). Closely Watched Films: An Introduction to the Art of Narrative Film Technique. University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-23862-1. p. 24 "...fictional bloody massacre on the Odessa Steps..."</ref><ref>Carr, Jay (Jan 1, 2002). The A-List: The National Society of Film Critics' 100 Essential Films. Da Capo Press. ISBN 0-306-81096-4. p. 29 "That there was, in fact, no czarist massacre on the Odessa Steps scarcely diminishes the power of the scene...It is ironic that he did it so well that today the bloodshed on the Odessa steps is often referred to as if it really happened." </ref>

The boots of the Tsarist soldiers shown marching down the "Odessa Steps".

The baby in the carriage falling down the "Odessa Steps".

A wide shot of the massacre on the "Odessa Steps".

[edit] Previous censorship and recent restoration

Image:Kino0.jpg

After its premiere in Soviet Union, it was later shown in an edited form in Germany, with some scenes of extreme violence edited out by its German distributors. A written introduction by Leon Trotsky was also cut from Soviet prints after he ran afoul of Josef Stalin. The film was banned in Nazi Germany, Britain, Spain, France, and other countries for its revolutionary zeal. It was even banned in the Soviet Union for a short period when the Comintern, for diplomatic reasons, ceased to promote mutiny among the navies of capitalist countries.

In 2004, a three year restoration of the film was completed. Many excised scenes of violence were restored, as well as the original written introduction by Leon Trotsky. The previous titles, which had toned down the mutinous sailors' revolutionary rhetoric, were corrected so that they would now be an accurate translation of the original Russian titles in the film.

[edit] Legacy

The original score was composed by Edmund Meisel. A salon orchestra performed the Berlin premiere in 1926; its instrumentation was flute/piccolo, trumpet, trombone, harmonium, percussion and strings without viola. Meisel wrote the score in twelve days and nights due to the late approval from the censorship board. Due to this problem, Meisel would repeat large sections of the score, unchanged, in an effort to complete the project. Composer/conductor Mark-Andreas Schlingensiepen has reorchestrated and improved the score based on the original piano score and has adjusted it to fit the reconstructed version of the film available today.

In its commercial format (on DVD, for example) the film is usually accompanied by pieces of classical music (Shostakovich) that have been subsequently added. In an attempt to make the film relevant for the 21st century, Pet Shop Boys composed a new soundtrack in 2004, accompanied by the Dresdner Sinfoniker orchestra. Their soundtrack, released as Battleship Potemkin in 2005, was premiered in September 2004 at an open-air concert in Trafalgar Square, London.