Battleship Potemkin (1925)

Battleship Potemkin (1925)

The Hype -

Voted No. 8 on the TSPDT 1,000 Greatest Films.

Roger Ebert -

"The Battleship Potemkin'' has been so famous for so long that it is almost impossible to come to it with a fresh eye. It is one of the fundamental landmarks of cinema...If today it seems more like a technically brilliant but simplistic... that may be because it has worn out its element of surprise--that, like the 23rd Psalm or Beethoven's Fifth, it has become so familiar we cannot perceive it for what it is"

Pauline Kael -

Voted the greatest film of all time by an international panel of critics in Brussels in (1958), as it had been in 1950, POTEMKIN (Russians and purists pronounce it Po-tyom-kin) has achieved such an unholy eminence that few people any longer dispute its merits. Great as it undoubtedly is, it's not really a likable film; it's amazing, though--it keeps its freshness and its excitement...

The Reality - A very long 65 minute silent movie. Battleship Potemkin is a BAD melodrama full of of bad acting and Cartoonish Soviet Propaganda. There is no character development or real plot. The story is quite simple. Its 1905 Odessa Russia. On the Potemkin, the nasty mustache twirling officers are oppressing the noble sailors. On shore in Odessa, the Cossacks and the Bourgeois are oppressing the noble workers. But they only take so much and start the Revolution - the end. Repetitively, the movie loops the same shots over and over again to fill the time. We see the same shot of the ship again and again. And the same shot of the sailors going up or down the decks over and over. Yes, the "Odessa Steps" scene is well done, but thats 2 minutes out of 65 minutes.

There's no reason to watch Battleship Potemkin 84 years later. Time has passed it by. It should be thrown on the ash heap of history - along with Marx, Trotsky and Lenin.

The Real Reason Its Rated Highly - First, its directed by Sergei Einstein the great Russian film maker. Cinemaphiles always overpraise any movie made by a great director. If the director was great - so their "logic" goes - the movie therefore must also be great. Secondly, its a landmark film. The film pioneered many techniques used in film since 1925. Thirdly, its communist propaganda, & that always warms the heart of the left-wing film critics. Fourth, its silent and list makers always feel they have to toss in a few silent films to be taken seriously.