Customer Reviews

Ivan the Terrible-Part 1 [VHS]

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This DVD of the classic Eisenstein movie is a bitter disappointment. The image quality is very bad with fuzzy pictures, wanting contrast and noise. The English subtitles can not be turned off and the opening credits have been butchered (live original footage and credits replaced by stills and English credits). Avoid and wait for a decent release of this wonderful film on DVD.

This DVD is nothing but a direct reproduction of the decrepit 35mm film. No attempt has been made at restoration; the sound track is exceptionally poor; the subtitles almost unreadable at times.

Don't be suckered in. Wait for a better distributor of this magnificent film.

For Westerners Ivan the Terrible is in the same mental pocket as such unlovely characters as Rasputin, Vlad the Impaler, and even Joseph Stalin. Although he definitely had a brutal and bloodthirsty side and looked rather creepy, he was also one of RussiaÕ's greatest statesmen (probably because he was so brutal and bloodthirsty and looked so creepy!).

Although depicting the achievements of a Tsar, this film got the go-ahead from the Communist authorities because Comrade Stalin identified with the central character and wanted to encourage patriotism. Eisenstein's ambivalent treatment of the nature of power in Part 2, however, offended Stalin who withdrew persmission to complete what was originally intended to be a trilogy

The two films that we have were made in the aftermath of the defeat of the German invasion as the Russian armies rolled West rather as they had rolled East in Ivan's day when Kazan and Astrakhan had fallen to the rising power of the Russian state.

When I first saw this film, it was a little like the first time I heard "Riders on the Storm" by the Doors: it just completely STOOD OUT from everything else on TV and in the cinema. I was immediately impressed by its intensity and uniqueness.

Every shot and scene are powerfully stylised, every statement emphasised and dramatised. Watching this, you realize how bland, wishy-washy, and sloppy most movies are by comparision. Artistic energy and craftsmanship are never absent for a moment. Nothing is left to chance, nothing is wasted; everything is touched by the central guiding genius. It is dense and muscular, and tense. The scenes have the same gravity and power as the scuptures and paintings of the great Michelangelo.

Some people might be amazed that such artistic heights were reached under a Communist system that repressed free expression, but here in the West we also have our own form of repression, perhaps even more insidious than the whims and dictates of Comrade Stalin. I refer to the pressure of making a buck! This was one pressure that Michelangelo didn't have when the Pope commissioned him to paint the Cistine Chapel, or Eisenstein when Stalin allowed him to make the first two great parts of this triology.

If you are already familiar with this masterpiece by Eisenstein, you know how difficult it is to find a print that does the brilliant photography and the Prokofiev score justice. I can recommend this VHS pair as the best version I've seen. It has the full main credits, clear electronic subtitles, translations of the lyrics and even dialogue which is often left out of other versions, and a cleaner look to the color sequences in part 2. All this with what resembles a fresh print from the negative. Highly recommended.

During World War II, with Russia in the grip of Stalin and with Hitler at its door, the greatest Russian director of his day, and perhaps ever, joined the greatest Russian actor of his day, to depict the dark and brooding story of the rise and fall of a ruthless Russian Tsar who tyrannized Russia during the 1500s. While the story hardly amounts to movie uplift, the joy and fascination here lies in the details. Straightaway, in episode one, there is perhaps the most amazing movie opening ever filmed, in the coronation of Ivan the Terrible. Those familiar with Theodor Dreyer's "Passion of Joan of Arc" in 1928 will appreciate what fascination can lie in watching the camera cut skillfully from one grotesque image to another in endlessly imaginative ways, almost as if the gargoyles themselves were about to speak. The fascinating imagery proceeds non-stop from there, in the hands of master craftsman and director Sergei Eisenstein, like a medieval masterpiece come to life, though the later segment (part two) did not quite rise to the exceptional quality of part one. A taste of the high production standards is gleaned from a musical score composed by the great classicist Sergei Prokofiev. A very, very Russian production -- dark and grim, but full of amazing levels of interest, just the kind of production spoofed by Woody Allen years later in "Love and Death." Not necessarily to everybody's taste, but a great treat for connoisseurs.

The art is always irreverent and doesn't know about previous imposed rules. What Stalin initially considered as striking propaganda device under his absolutist, oppressive, abrasive and despotic Regime, was employed by the irreverent Eisenstein as epic saga, but that increasingly derivates what so many times has been said for many heralds before him (Shakespeare, for instance) about the irreversible and dramatic final destiny of all repressive government, so well stated by Saint Just: "The power corrupts; and the politic power corrupts absolutely."

One of the universal patrimonies of the cinema!

This DVD reproduction is at a good quality. The image is clear, as the best as you can expect from a movie made 60 years ago. Only a little scratch. From time to time, the picture shacks a bit, but you would not be distracted. Not all the Russian dialogue had been translated into English subtitle, but I had not hard time to understand what the characters' pose and expression meant.

There are two things bothered me a little. The first is the subtitle sometimes blends into the B/W background. The second is even though the picture has been said to be kept as its original 1.33:1 aspect ratio, I doubt that the edge has been chopped a little bit. Since I never had a chance to seen the original one, I don't really have a clue to blame the DVD. Over all, this product is a great chance to enjoy this master piece in the 21st century anyway.

I've seen most of Eisenstein's films and Ivan the Terrible (1,2) is his best. The film is entirely based on history but focuses on the nature of power and the figure of Ivan. Ivan is portrayed in differnt ways. At first he is heroic and made to look like the victim of more evil people than himself. In the second part he struggles to understand himsself and is plagued by self doubt. He's very much like Hamlet in fact. The acting by the extremely tall Cherkasov is just slightly over the top but it suits the Shakesperean quality of the story.. Eisenstein experimented with sevarl techniques to accent the sensation of power and evil that sorrounded Ivan and the murdfer scene in the Cathedral is the culmination. The film was to have featured a third part but Stalin cut the project short, due to the critical character of power that the film had taken on in the 2nd part. It's not for everyone, but for students ot those interested ion the psychological effects of power and dicataors everywhere it's excellent.

This double film is a masterpiece in many ways. It took two years of research before starting to come out of thin air and being filmed. The first part came out in 1944 and the second part in 1945. This means the research was done when the USSR was down under the feet of the nazis. The first part came out when the tide had turned and the Russians were already advancing in Poland. The second part came out after the fall of Berlin or close before. The political meaning at the time was clear. The first part was singing the praise of the man who unified Russia, just like it was necessary in the war years to reunify the USSR for the last push to Berlin. The second part is slightly different since it was the time when Ivan the Terrible had to face the plots and conspiracy from the Boyars, the nobles and the top echelon church people and he had to defeat them with wise schemes more than just plain violence. That was of course essential after the war to face the various groups of people who could have spoken out of unity now the outside danger was eliminated. But we have to go beyond this immediate and historical value of the film when it was shot. It is a masterpiece because Eisenstein uses rather simple means to produce an epic film whose every scene is poignant, powerful, impressive, etc. Eisenstein uses all the possibilities his know-how and experience provide him with. Of course he uses black and white to play on shade, shadows and contrast so that some scenes are frightening and quite in the line of the big masters of horror of the late 20s, Fritz Lang or Murnau. He uses the body language and the composition of the scenes and setting to make every single square centimeter meaningful and active. The hands, the faces, the bodies are among the best actors of the film along with the actors themselves, quite in the line of what Eisenstein was doing in the 20s, but even better because he was able to use their lips in order to make them speak. The soundtrack is prodigious. He composes a real symphony with voices used in the most dramatic and expressive way, with all kinds of sounds and noise that give a real depth to the pictures on the screen and the voices of the actors, and finally the outstanding music score by Prokofiev: probably one of the best film music ever and that music totally avoids the repetitiveness of the music of the old silent films to create a fully developed universe of its own that amplifies the voices and the sounds and noises. That creates the epic atmosphere the story itself needs. What's more, in the second part, the use of color for two reels of the film shows the force of the black and white reels, and at the same time shows how Eisenstein can use the color of these reels in order to create a different but similar contrast, this time centered on red dominating the various other colors that are essentially, white, black and yellow. The red of these reels becomes the expression of life and at the same time of some oppressiveness coming from some danger that red also designates (and surprisingly enough we cannot find any "revolutionary" meaning to that red, but we may be missing some inside meaning in the USSR of the time). The films have been digitally re-mastered but not in any way changed: we still have the jerky pictures of those days and the blurry sound track of before digital sound (even the music that could have been re-recorded). And it is good because we really have the impression to watch an old film from the 50s. By the way do not believe what the historical presentation of the bonuses tell you, in English, at least in my edition, because it is purely there to pacify those who may see Stalin behind Ivan.

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne, University Paris 8 Saint Denis, University Paris 12 Créteil, CEGID

Eisenstein's "Ivan the Terrible" is a visual experience not to be missed. The acting's not anything to write home about. Nikolai Cherkasov's portrayal of Ivan is so overdone that his extravagant gestures remind one of the silent film variety. Nor is the script a particularly good one. The two parts of the film are a bit disjointed.

But what IS excellent is the cinematography. It's not wide of the mark to say that the real stars of the film are the shadows and light. In this first part, we get a breathtaking preview of just what Eisenstein is capable of in the scene of the poisoned tsarina's funeral bier. Ivan's profile is situated in front of candlesticks in such a way as to suggest not only incredible loneliness but also destiny. We also see glimmers of the huge shadows cast by tiny humans trick that will dominate the second part. It's all really quite incredible.

Plot-wise, the first part of "Ivan the Terrible" sets the stage for Ivan's on-going power struggle with the boyars, the traditional aristocracy. It begins at his coronation, details the connivances of the boyars, led by Ivan's own aunt (a character that is especially one-dimensional), features Ivan's war against the Kazars, and crescendos with the poisoning of his beloved wife Anastasia. The emphasis throughout is the need for strong centralized leadership if the Russian Empire is to be saved from enemies east and west. Stalin loved it.