The Cinema Of Eisenstein

The Cinema of Eisenstein is David Bordwell's comprehensive analysis of the films of Sergei Eisenstein, arguably the key figure in the entire history of film. The director of such classics as Potemkin, Ivan the Terrible, October, Strike, and Alexander Nevsky, Eisenstein theorized montage, presented Soviet realism to the world, and mastered the concept of film epic. Comprehensive, authoritative, and illustrated throughout, this classic work deserves to be on the shelf of every serious student of cinema.

An introduction to Deleuze's theory of cinema, from a leading American film theorist.

A classic on the aesthetics of filmmaking from the pioneering Soviet director who made Battleship Potemkin. Though he completed only a half-dozen films, Sergei Eisenstein remains one of the great names in filmmaking, and is also renowned for his theory and analysis of the medium. Film Form collects twelve essays, written between 1928 and 1945, that demonstrate key points in the development of Eisenstein’s film theory and in particular his analysis of the sound-film medium. Edited, translated, and with an introduction by Jay Leyda, this volume allows modern-day film students and fans to gain insights from the man who produced classics such as Alexander Nevsky and Ivan the Terrible and created the renowned “Odessa Steps” sequence.

Among early directors, Sergei Eisentein stands alone as the maker of a fully historical cinema. James Goodwin treats issues of revolutionary history and historical representation as central to an understanding of Eisentein's work, which explores two movements within Soviet history and consciousness: the Bolshevik Revolution and the Stalinist state. Goodwin articulates intersections between Eisentein's ideas and aspects of the thought of Walter Benjamin, Georg Lukács, Ernst Bloch, and Bertolt Brecht. He also shows how the formal properties and filmic techniques of each work reveal perspectives on history . Individual chapters focus on Strike, Battleship Potemkin, October, Old and New, projects of the 1930s, Alexander Nevsky, and Ivan the Terrible.

Luka Arsenjuk considers Sergei Eisenstein as a filmmaker and a theorist, drawing on philosophers such as G.W.F. Hegel and Gilles Deleuze - as well as Eisenstein's untranslated texts - to reframe how we think about the great director and his legacy.

List of illustrations; Acknowledgements; Preface; Introduction; 1 -- Audiovisual Counterpoint; 2 -- Organic Unity; 3 -- Nonindifferent Nature; 4 -- Synasthesia; Notes; Bibliography; A note on the versions of Eisenstein's films consulted; Index.

A renowned Soviet director discusses his theory of film as an artistic medium which must appeal to all senses and applies it to an analysis of sequences from his major movies.

The first comprehensive book on the extensive, yet rarely seen, graphic works of pioneering filmmaker Sergei Eisenstein Sergei Eisenstein is regarded as one of cinema’s greatest revolutionaries. Less well known is that he was also a prolific graphic artist who drew compulsively as a means of expressing his ideas. Arranged chronologically, Eisenstein on Paper is divided into six chapters, each prefaced by short texts relating to the graphic works of each distinct period, and interwoven with excerpts from Eisenstein’s own essays and diary entries. In 1930 Eisenstein traveled to the United States and then Mexico, where he produced hundreds of drawings influenced by ancient and contemporary Mexican art. Forced to return to Russia in 1932, Eisenstein came under the scrutiny of the Communist government and, struggling to make further films without political interference, turned again to sketching for artistic freedom. By the end of his life, he had pared his style down to the utmost simplicity and sincerity. Despite completing relatively few films in his lifetime, Eisenstein made several thousand drawings. Eisenstein on Paper is the product of a groundbreaking collaboration with RGALI, the Russian State Archive of Arts and Literature, and is a fitting tribute to an incredible graphic talent.