Flawed But Compelling

Rating: 8/10 (18 December 2007)

BATTLESHIP POTEMKIN begins with a compliment of sailors asleep in their hammocks where one of them is woken by a blow from a petty officer . The reason ? No reason except for the petty officer to vent his rage upon someone lower down the military hierarchy . A few minutes later we see what the ordinary sailors have to eat - rotten , maggot infested meat . When the sailors protest about this inedible diet their complaints are quickly dismissed by the ship's doctor Smirnov who tells them to wash the meat with brine . Very quickly Eisenstien has let the audience know whose side they should take . These men in the service of their country are treated worse than the Russians in Japanese POW camps . When the crew complain the ship's captain Golikov threatens to have the entire crew hanged . This leads to a mutiny . When the Potemkin sails to the port of Odessa we see the brutality of the Tsarist regime . Men , woman and children are massacred on the Odessa stairway
I've got to be honest here . This is a very overstated film . In fact it comes close to shooting itself in the foot with its revolutionary tributes . Watch the early scene where Smirnov inspects the meat . Was anyone else reminded of a Monty Python sketch " This meat is rotten " - " No it's not it's just pining for the fjords " But when all is said and done it does contain the Odessa sequence which remains the most analysed and referenced scene in the history of cinema . Also take note of how well and how fast everything is edited and compare this with the way Spielberg and Van Sant keep a ridiculously long average shot duration . You might not agree with Eisenstein's politics but we can all agree that this director's reputation is very hard earned and well deserved