A biography of the first czar of Russia was the final movie project of the great Sergei Eisenstein's life. It would be his undoing, as Stalin was not pleased with part II of this epic. But Ivan the Terrible, Part I still stands as a magnificent, rich, and strange achievement. This is a "composed" film to make Hitchcock look slapdash; every frame is arranged with the eye of a painter or choreographer, the mise-en-scène so deliberately artificial that even the actors' bodies become elements
of style. (They complained about contorting themselves to fit Eisenstein's designs.) If you don't believe movies can be art, this could be (and has been) dismissed as ludicrous. But Eisenstein's command of light and shadow becomes its own justification, as the fascinating court intrigue plays out in a series of dynamic, eye-filling scenes. This is not a political theorist, but a director drunk on pure cinema. --Robert Horton
This is one of the most distinctive great films in the history of cinema -- freakishly mannerist, yet so vivid in its obsessions and expressionist angularity that it virtually invents its own genre.
Most revealing as an unintended allegory for Russian rulers' continuing will, in their aspiration for absolutism, to lead a powerful and menacing empire, regardless of those people far below who get crushed by an iron fist.
Under strict instructions not to employ conceptual devices such as montage, Eisenstein still manages to provide powerful images and, with set pieces, distil the sense of pomp and circumstance surrounding the Tsar.
Sergei Eisenstein made a two part epic about Ivan the Terrible in the 1940's in the USSR. Both films are good and recommended. The first part starts with Ivan's coronation and shows his continuing battles with the boyars. In this segment, Ivan places a great deal of emphasis on why he should have absolute power.
This can be seen as a defense of Stalin's absolute hold on his country at the time this film was made. It's ironic because Eisenstein is using a Tsar to defend the rule of a Communist leader. The second part is about the end of Ivan's battle with the boyars as he starts to use peasants as his enforcers in a brutal crackdown. Now, Eisenstein is starting to examine some of the negative aspects of absolute rule. The film climaxes with a delirious banquet scene filmed in color.
April 30, 2010
Walter M.
Super Reviewer
Beginning on a severely melodramatic note and ending on a powerful one, as if in a crescendo; dense, detailed, and rich set-pieces and costumes; Sergei Eisenstein's visionary biopic is at times an epic, and at other times a small-scale drama, but mostly pure cinematic artistry and a visually sumptuous character study.
97/100
More at: http://thegreatestreview.blogspot.com/2011/01/he-aint-all-that-bad.html
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