Battleship Potemkin

Director: Sergei Eisenstein

1925 / 66min / 35mm

An epic dramatization of the mutiny of the crew of the namesake vessel, a dreadnought in the Imperial Russian Navy’s Black Sea Fleet, whose uprising was one of many that marked the revolutionary year of 1905 in the troubled Tsardom; also the film that, as much as any single work, exemplifies the florid experimentation of early Soviet cinema, its oft imitated but never bettered “Odessa Steps” sequence a film school staple since the opening of the very first film school. Judged as propaganda, a work of incomparable clarity of focus and sledgehammer force—even Joseph Goebbels had to grudgingly admit to its effectiveness. Judged as art: a model of cinematic dynamism that has posed a challenge to everyone who has attempted to follow in its path.

Distributor: Kino Lorber

Part of The Best of... 1925