"Smash the dragons, smash them!"

Rating: 8/10 (1 March 2018)

This silent films is organized in chapters, or as some other reviewers refer to them, as montages, though it didn't seem to me that the technique was needed. The story moves fairly seamlessly and the viewer has no trouble following the sequence of events; the title cards signaling each montage is almost like a break in the flow of the story. Even so, this is a gripping film, all the more compelling for it's production during the silent era under director Sergei M. Eisenstein. There is an early preface relative to individuals falling under the spell of mass consciousness which itself dissolves into revolutionary fervor, and that theme dominates the story. As impressive as the movie is, I was totally awed by the sequence involving the citizenry of Odessa filing out on that incredibly long strip of land with ocean on both sides, for the viewing of Grigory Vakulinchuk, leader of the mutiny aboard the Potemkin protesting inhumane conditions and rotting meat masquerading as food for the sailors. And as so often has happened with my movie viewing pleasure, I was rewarded once again with a moment of cosmic serendipity upon witnessing the Odessa Staircase montage with it's baby carriage sequence. I had no idea that was coming, and with my very prior viewing of "The Untouchables", the scene had me just about jumping out of my seat. If that comment makes no sense to the reader, you'll just have to watch both films, and not necessarily back to back, as the sequence under consideration will be most apparent. The only negative I found with 'Potemkin' was the obvious use of a model used in some long views of the battleship which brought down the professionalism of the project. Otherwise, this was a competently made film, all the more so for it's silent era origins, and one which every cinema fan should see at least once.