Lenin leads the charge in October
"It is clever, but a bore. It is kaleidoscopic, so much so that when months seem to have passed since one saw a man with a flag of truce, you find he is still sitting there in the same position awaiting an answer...There is crammed into this film enough for a half dozen productions, but most of the episodes are unfinished...Some of the action is a little muddled, but where Eisenstein does masterful work is in those scenes with hundreds and hundreds of people. It really seems as if they were part of the revolution, as if the scenes belonged in a newsreel."-Mordaunt Hall, New York Times, November 3, 1928.
I largely agree with many of the points of the above review comrades. I didn't like this film as much as Potemkin or Strike, as I began to shake me head after awhile trying to keep up with the mass of characters in this epic production. But Eisenstein's big scenes are still something to behold and were understandably influential to the ever growing cinematic language.-Comrade Cox, 1001: A Film Odyssey
That review from New York Times is spot on. It is pretty chaotic and experimental in style.
ReplyDeleteApparently Eisenstein was charged by the Communist party to make a movie commemorating the anniversary of the revolution, but I wonder if they were to terribly pleased with the result. Can you imagine the farmers and workers of the Sovjet union crowding the cinemas, trying to make sense of this movie?