The Moment When Editing Became an Art

Rating: 9/10 (29 July 2016)

In all respects that matter, this film hasn't aged a day.
Sure, the story is hamfisted, but so what? It's basically a propaganda movie. I'm not watching it for depth of character. That's not the reason it has endured. Sure, it's almost dreadfully short, but so what? Films can show a lot in 69 minutes if they don't dawdle, and this film doesn't even think about dawdling.
Through and through, it feels like a 20's movie, but it feels like how you want 20's movies to feel, how 20's movies have been portrayed as feeling by our nostalgia for that time as well as the Hollywood Machine itself. Most twenties movies, while charming, lack cinematic sophistication. The actors can be funny or poignant, but the effects are lacking and the camera work looks like it was done by someone who had never been to film school. Many end up feeling like half-finished films. It's hard to embrace films from that era, even films that I want to like and are interesting, such as Nosferatu or the original King Kong, because of this. I can appreciate them, but appreciation does not translate perfectly into affection.
This film is different. I wouldn't go so far as to call it the best film I've ever seen, as some film critics have, but it is definitely a awe-inspiring accomplishment. It's not only astonishingly good, it's astonishingly good in a dynamic, electrifying way. The title cards don't just exist to provide information- they punctuate the story beats. Each scene flows into the next. Each part flows into the next. There are montages and elaborate wide shots and quick, clever cuts. It's better on a technical scale than most films released today.
Nothing is done without a purpose though. Every shot and trick furthers some thought or feeling. It's both lean and remarkably ambitious. It does not run for three hours, but it tries and mostly succeeds to capture the emotions of the audience. Eisenstein knew what he was doing; he had to. Many of the creative technical work was his invention. When Hollywood filmmakers saw this film, they were shocked. They had never seen anything like it before.
This deserves a place among the films that changed absolutely everything. Just like there is a pre-Citizen Kane era and a post-Citizen Kane era, there is a pre-Potemkin era and a post-Potemkin era. Every film buff has their favorite Potemkin shot. Mine is the long shot on the steps where the woman holding her injured son is shot by the Cossacks.
Back in the day, even people who didn't know exactly what made this movie special couldn't stop thinking about it. Fundamentally, it is different from every film that was made beforehand. Even now, I can hardly think of a film that's made me care so much about a scenario I would have otherwise cared so little about.
I've repeatedly said that even as an outsider from the 21st century, it's possible to tell an innovator from a copier. Even if you didn't know anything about Star Wars, it's easy to differentiate it from the works that copied off it. The original carries itself with a poise, an energy that the copiers just don't have. It's in the 'blood' of the film, if you will. This film has that. I can see myself rewatching it over and over again. It's one of the most gripping motion pictures of the 20th century.