A Man with a Movie Camera

Just saw this 1929 Russian film. It was in Time’s top 100 films list. This must be the oldest film I’ve ever seen (My Grandpa was a 1year old toddler when this was being made!

Did I like it? Well, just as any avant-garde movie I’ve seen – I didn’t just didn’t get it. It was way over my small head – all I saw was random Moscow scenes with some excellent BGM score. Tell that to an art historian – I would have probably been court-martialed.

But switching on the DVD commentary, a film professor did give some insights on how it was a effective the film was as a soviet propaganda tool, a stark commentary on social divide, a modern expression of grandeur and delight, a strong statement of Anti-Americanism or as Time says a ‘poetic tribute to modernism’s hopeful beginnings’. Woah woah, hold your horses there – where did you guys see all that? Was it in that shot of a sleeping beggar scratching his underarms? Or was it in the infinitely spinning cotton yarn or that horse will runs forever or that 3min shot of a static bridge? I just don’t get it – why don’t they rate these art films as IQ-155, just like PG-13.

But to the films credit, I was spellbound by some of its technical accomplishments – freeze-frames, dual stitch shots, multi edits, time lapse, claymation type of motion, special effects, sync background score – it certainly was an monumental accomplishment at that time. But the intended message was well hidden – maybe that’s the purpose, coz only a few are supposed to read the encrypted meaning (being a communist tool) or maybe I didn’t understand it coz I didn’t belong to that era –
Grandpa? What do you think?

*** (3/5)