Reviews

It really takes a lot for me to hate a movie nowadays. Before I knew the true connotations of the word, I used to toss it around willy-nilly at any film I merely disliked. I'm even embarrassed by some of the films I used to say I hated. There have been very few films I've hated since I've graduated high school, because by that point I had learned to avoid wasting my father's hard-earned dollars on Catwoman and Gigli. But then I walked into this mind- numbing monstrosity of a film that made me want to hurt things. Badly. I wanted to hurt the projectionist for even so much as showing the film, because by screening it that day, he made everybody in that theatre dumber and angrier.

There is no plot in the film so to speak, and the jokes are stretched out for painfully long periods of time in order to compensate for the fact that without them, the film would be no more than a glorified television ad. It basically is a glorified television ad in its final form, but nothing more. The fact that people actually gave these untalented hacks money to make something that they probably knew wouldn't be any good is proof that the world is going downhill. If there was any justice, the filmmakers would be tied up with piano wire, hurled off a cliff into a sea filled with rich BP oil, and keelhauled through a shredding machine. And all the world would lose would be two shitty movie makers.

Note: there are some spoilers and I'm saying this so people don't call me an asshole.

I recently saw this film for film class and it wasn't too bad. In terms of directing Eisenstein owns the film. It's as if he's the star of the movie, like what Michael Mann did with "Collateral." The first third on the boat with the mutiny is excellent. Sets up character, plot and tone perfectly.

And then there's the massacre at Odessa. The horrific beauty of it. It shows how pointless killing is. The baby carriage going down the steps has proved to be one of the most iconic images in cinema. Also the lion sequence...who ever would've thought of doing a scene like that? Only Eisenstein.

But then there's the final third. The problem is that it's anticlimactic. I'm not sure how much of the movie is based on fact, but the soldiers winning...it's kind of a deus ex machnia. Eisenstien felt after a lot of suffering to give the heroes what they wanted. The problem is that you think Eisenstein is building up to a big final fight and then he tricks you.

It's a little cheap. I would've rather seen a huge final action scene.

The greatest movie ever made? No. But absolutely a very good film and one that should be studied.

Grade: B