Arsenal

For several years I had a decent quality print on video and was always fascinated by this film. Very few motion pictures are as visually striking and intense, but little of the story came through. I just purchased the DVD and the audio commentary track by Vance Kepley really illuminated "Arsenal". Undoubtedly the finest commentary I've yet heard. If this classic movie isn't your cup of tea, get the DVD anyway. Dovzhenko was an artist like few others. His work really deserves rediscovery; hopefully future releases of "Zvenigora", "Earth" and "Aerograd" will have Kepley's commentary as well. But even as they are, Dovzhenko's films are truly essential.

It goes without saying that silent cinema requires emphasis on the imagery. Alexander Dovzhenko's "Arsenal" is no exception. The look back at World War I over the past year should draw attention to this movie. Like Lewis Milestone's "All Quiet on the Western Front", this movie looks at the futility of war. The focus in the Kiev Arsenal January Uprising in 1918. Probably the most effective scene is the laughing gas: a man artificially laughs while surrounded by all manner of horror, a perfect metaphor for the disconnect between the image and reality of war.

The only other Dovzhenko movie that I've seen is "Earth". I understand that "Arsenal" and "Earth" are the second and third installments of his Ukraine Trilogy. I'll have to see "Zvenigora", as well as the rest of Dovzhenko's movies. Despite the obvious propaganda, this is still a movie that you have to see just for the imagery if nothing else. Like Sergei Eisenstein's "Battleship Potemkin", it contains some of the most unforgettable images in cinema history. Definitely see it.

I call this a near-masterpiece because of the basic purpose of it, which is propaganda. This film exists as agitprop, and while it contains phenomenal and ferocious imagery, ultimately the single-minded viewpoint hobbles it as art and undercuts its slight attempts at humanity. While it can be viewed as a Revolutionary piece, exhorting a 'proper' spirit of energy, knowing it was made by a Ukrainian in 1929 while the Stalinist regime was either plotting or bumbling their way to the Great Famine makes this film deeply questionable in a moral sense. The theme of a Ukrainian learning Revolutionary values in the Great War, then returning to destroy the 'corrupt' forces of 'old Ukraine' made me deeply uneasy. That said, the imagery and sequences in this (quite late) silent film are second to none. The toothless, laughing soldier is one of the most stunning single images ever committed to film; and the general pacing, with a deliberate, lingering sense of time, forces concentration on the set-pieces. Much of the film is brutal, inhuman, and cruel. This is both an accurate representation of the setting itself and of the type of violent us-vs.-them propaganda produced by the Soviets at the time. I find this film VERY unsettling from a moral standpoint, something I don't often find myself saying. But, again, the masterful and stunning imagery makes it well worth viewing more than once.

While often a bit obscure, this Dovzhenko classic is also filled with interesting and often thought-provoking images and themes. "Arsenal", as with his better-known feature "Earth", defies easy description. "Earth" is probably the more artistic of the two, but "Arsenal" is more complex, and it might also be a little closer - at least in places - to a conventional narrative.

The first ten minutes or so of "Arsenal" are quite abstract, with a succession of mini-montages depicting a variety of subjects. It would be hard, and perhaps inadvisable, to assign a specific meaning to all of the symbols, but they are clearly meant to convey some general ideas that apply to the story that follows, which is set in the Ukraine as World War I (or the Great War) is coming to an end.

The war sequences might be the most memorable part of the movie, and the chilling "laughing gas" sequence is a more compelling comment on war than are the great majority of complicated carnage-filled scenes in other movies.

The main story starts with the demobilization, and it is clearly influenced by Dovzhenko's own perspective. He does his very best to resolve two seemingly contradictory priorities, with his devotion to the Ukrainian people and his support for the Soviet state. He uses all his skills, with interesting montages and other techniques, including some creative camera angles that would even have impressed Orson Welles.

As politics, not all of it is convincing by any means, but as cinema, it is quite interesting, and at times it provides good food for thought. The specific issues considered in the film may be limited to their own time and place, but in asking what is best for his people, Dovzhenko also raises some broader issues that allow the movie to retain some relevance in later eras as well.

A group of Ukranian soldiers return from World War One to more fighting in the Communist Revolution.

This is an extraordinary, kinetic and moving piece of film making, full of metaphor and of great relevance for people throughout the world today. It isn't necessary to understand the complexities of the times to understand the rich emotional resonance. Particularly innovative is Dovzhenko's use of rhythm and inter-spliced scenes.

I was lucky enough to see a restored version of this at the Cambridge Film Festival 2003, with live musical accompaniment. Particularly memorable scenes are the undefeatable worker, the laughing gas, and the horse team rushing to take a fallen comrade to burial before returning to battle.