A war film that is gritty and yet sheer poetry on the screen. There are so many visually stunning shots in Ivan's Childhood that I was often simply awestruck. The film delivers a message of national pride for the Soviets having defeated the Germans, but does it in such an unconventional way stylistically, and highlights the brutal human cost of the war in one of the simplest yet heart-wrenching ways possible, via an orphan (Nikolay Burlyaev in the titular role). He's not just any orphan, he's a tough 12 year old bent on revenge because his family has been killed, and he's taken up top-secret scouting missions for the army. Tarkovsky makes fantastic use of the contrast between dream/fantasy sequences and harsh reality, and even the latter is highly stylized, giving the film a lyrical, haunting feeling to it. He also did a great job in casting Burlyaev, who shows the range of innocence and joy in his dreams and surprises us with how hardnosed he is in reality. Valentina Malyavina is also quite striking as the young medical assistant, with her big, soulful eyes.
Despite what is a fairly straightforward plot, the film can be a little disorienting at times, as Tarkovsky challenges us to fill in little gaps or interpret what we see, but it's never onerously so. He tells the story as a poet would, and gives us so many extraordinary images ... the dream sequence involving the well, with camera pointing upwards from beneath the water ... the birch forest with its endless trees, and that kissing scene (wow!) ... Ivan walking into a spiky circular phalanx of war ruins ... the sequence on the beach, with the game in which the children tellingly all fall down, and then Ivan running along the water with the little girl. He experiments with effects, camera angles, and even a couple of wonderful moments where the camera suddenly takes the dizzying point of view of a character. All of that makes the film dreamlike, but we also see devastation, and actual footage of some of the Nazi leaders and their families found after having committed suicide at the end of the war. There is such sadness here, and poignancy in the question "will this be the last war on earth?" Highly recommended, especially if you're new to Tarkovsky, since at 95 minutes the film has a concision and pace to it that many of his other films don't.
Despite what is a fairly straightforward plot, the film can be a little disorienting at times, as Tarkovsky challenges us to fill in little gaps or interpret what we see, but it's never onerously so. He tells the story as a poet would, and gives us so many extraordinary images ... the dream sequence involving the well, with camera pointing upwards from beneath the water ... the birch forest with its endless trees, and that kissing scene (wow!) ... Ivan walking into a spiky circular phalanx of war ruins ... the sequence on the beach, with the game in which the children tellingly all fall down, and then Ivan running along the water with the little girl. He experiments with effects, camera angles, and even a couple of wonderful moments where the camera suddenly takes the dizzying point of view of a character. All of that makes the film dreamlike, but we also see devastation, and actual footage of some of the Nazi leaders and their families found after having committed suicide at the end of the war. There is such sadness here, and poignancy in the question "will this be the last war on earth?" Highly recommended, especially if you're new to Tarkovsky, since at 95 minutes the film has a concision and pace to it that many of his other films don't.