DVD: Arsenal & Zvenigora | reviews, news & interviews
DVD: Arsenal & Zvenigora
DVD: Arsenal & Zvenigora
Two silent Soviet classics from the 1920s
Saturday, 19 February 2011
'Arsenal': Its iconic imagery resembles the photographic style of Rodchenko
What a time of ferment of artistic revolution the 1920s were in the Soviet Union. Pioneering arts techniques overlapped for an all-too-brief period with the progressive ideology of communism. Alexander Dovzhenko’s Arsenal and Zvenigora were at the forefront of such trends, but as a Ukrainian his feelings about Moscow’s new leaps forward were ambiguous. Dovzhenko had a deep visual love for the old order, even while he celebrated the dynamism of the new.
What a time of ferment of artistic revolution the 1920s were in the Soviet Union. Pioneering arts techniques overlapped for an all-too-brief period with the progressive ideology of communism. Alexander Dovzhenko’s Arsenal and Zvenigora were at the forefront of such trends, but as a Ukrainian his feelings about Moscow’s new leaps forward were ambiguous. Dovzhenko had a deep visual love for the old order, even while he celebrated the dynamism of the new.
Explore topics
Share this article
The future of Arts Journalism
You can stop theartsdesk.com closing!
We urgently need financing to survive. Our fundraising drive has thus far raised £33,000 but we need to reach £100,000 or we will be forced to close. Please contribute here: https://gofund.me/c3f6033d
And if you can forward this information to anyone who might assist, we’d be grateful.
Subscribe to theartsdesk.com
Thank you for continuing to read our work on theartsdesk.com. For unlimited access to every article in its entirety, including our archive of more than 15,000 pieces, we're asking for £5 per month or £40 per year. We feel it's a very good deal, and hope you do too.
To take a subscription now simply click here.
And if you're looking for that extra gift for a friend or family member, why not treat them to a theartsdesk.com gift subscription?
more Film
Blu-ray: Golem
This Polish 1979 Meyrink adaptation is a visually striking dystopian drama
Captain America: Brave New World review - talking loud, saying nothing
Muddled filler between Avengers films which hardly deserves Harrison Ford
To a Land Unknown review - the migrant hustle
A slick tale of two refugees striving and surviving in Athens
Memoir of a Snail review - deliciously offbeat Australian animation
A darkly whimsical stop-motion masterpiece examining the shells we create for ourselves
Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy review - older, sadder Bridget has started ditching the ditz
Michael Morris's deft direction produces a maturer kind of romcom
theartsdesk Q&A: Iranian director Mohammad Rasoulof on 'The Seed of the Sacred Fig' - 'It became a question of self-respect'
The exiled filmmaker on authoritarian minds, reluctant radicalism and Iran's future
Blu-ray: High and Low
Akira Kurosawa’s multi-layered Japanese noir, brilliantly plotted
Bring Them Down review - ramming it home in the west of Ireland
Directorial debut features strong performances and too much violence
September 5 review - gripping real-life thriller
The ground-breaking, if flawed media coverage of the 1972 Munich massacre
Blu-ray: Stray Dog
Kurosawa's post-war Tokyo noir gleans societal guilt as a cop hunts his purloined pistol
Hard Truths review - a bravura, hyperreal performance from Marianne Jean-Baptiste
Grudges and gloom offset by love and support make for an unsettling mix
Saturday Night review - a dizzying 90-minute trip to a landmark TV event
Jason Reitman captures the full chaos of SNL's 1975 launch
Add comment