Battleship Potemkin

Overview

Classic Russian silent film dramatizing the 1905 mutiny of sailors aboard the battleship Potemkin, which spread to a civilian rebellion against the Czar in the city of Odessa. The sequence of Czarist troops massacring the townspeople has remained one of the most powerful and brilliantly crafted moments in the history of film.

Product Details

Release Date:	07/09/2015
UPC:	0644827140220
Original Release:	1925
Source:	Reel Vault
Language:	English
Sales rank:	23,750

Cast & Crew

Performance Credits

Vladimir Barsky	Cmdr. Golikov
Mikhail Gomorov	Matushenko
Levchenko	Boatswain
Repnikova	Woman on Steps
Marusov	Officer
Alexander Lyoshin	Petty Officer
Beatrice Vitoldi	Mother with Baby Carriage
Konstantin Feldman	Student Feldman
Protopopov	Old Man
Korobei	Legless Veteran
Yulia Eisenstein	Lady Bringing Forth Fruit to Mutineers
A. Glauberman	Aba
Prokopenko	Aba's Mother
N. Paultautseva	School Teacher
Iona Biy-Brodskiy	Intellectual
Zerenin	Student
Sailors of the Red Navy	Themselves
Members of the Proletcult Theater	Actor
Aleksandr Antonov	Vakulinchuk,Vokulinchuk
Aleksandr Levshin	Actor,Actor
Ivan Bobrov	Humiliated Soldier
Grigoriy Aleksandrov	Chief Officer Giliarovsky
Andrey Fayt	Recruit
Vladimir Uralskiy	Actor
Daniil Antonovich	Sailor
M. Brodsky	Intellectual
Citizens of Odessa	Themselves
Sergey Eyzenshteyn	Priest
A. Fait	Actor
Grigori Alexandrov	Actor
Yati Durant	Composer
Erik Ellamen	Composer
Eric Allaman	Composer
Edmund Meisel	Composer
Neil Tennant	Composer
Dmitri Shostakovich	Composer

Technical Credits

Sergey Eyzenshteyn

Nina Agadzhanova

Nikolay Aseev

Sergey Tretyakov

Nina Shutko

Sergei Eisenstein	Director
Sergey Eyzenshteyn	Screenwriter
Nina Agadzhanova	Screenwriter
Nikolay Aseev	Screenwriter
Sergey Tretyakov	Screenwriter
Nina Shutko	Screenwriter

Editorial Reviews

Selected to make a film commemorating the failed 1905 revolution against the czar, Soviet filmmaker, film teacher, and film theorist Sergei Eisenstein decided to concentrate on one exemplary event, the mutiny aboard the battleship Potemkin. Cast with non-actors and structured in five "acts" depicting the uprising and its violent aftermath, Potemkin maximized the dramatic impact of the historical incident by balancing documentary-style realism with Eisenstein's meticulous orchestration of visual composition and editing. Eisenstein used his concept of "intellectual montage" to create sensational and psychological effects, most effectively in the "Odessa Steps sequence" depicting the massacre of innocent citizens by czarist Cossacks. Expanding screen time to emphasize the event's terror, Eisenstein rapidly cut among soldiers' boots implacably advancing down the steps, crowds fleeing, such individual horrors as a mother confronting the soldiers with her dead child, and, most famously, a baby's carriage careening out of control. Using editing to create an impression of violence and carnage greater than anything actually shown onscreen, Eisenstein emphatically revealed the expressive potential of the 30-year-old medium. After its 1926 debut, Potemkin rapidly became world-renowned; even in countries where it was officially banned as Soviet propaganda, the power of Eisenstein's unprecedented cinematic creativity could not be denied. The Odessa Steps sequence has since become perhaps the single most famous and influential four minutes of film ever made.