Synopses & Reviews
KINO The Russian Cinema Series:This series of books examines Russian and Soviet film in their historical and aesthetic context, both as a major cultural force in Russian history and Soviet politics and as a crucible for experimentation that is central to the development of world cinema culture. Drawing authors from both East and West, the books in this series combine the best of scholarship with a style of writing that is accessible to a broad readership, whether that readership's primary interest lies in cinema or in Russian and Soviet political history.
Savage Junctures provides fresh insights into Eisenstein's films and writings. It examines the multiple contexts within which his films evolved and Eisenstein's appropriation of all of world culture as his source. Like Eisenstein himself, Anne Nesbet is particularly interested in the possibilities of visual image making and each chapter addresses the problem of his image-based thinking from a different perspective. Each chapter also offers a fundamentally new interpretation of the films and writings that make up his oeuvre. This is a major new contribution to studies in Soviet cinema and culture and to the field of film studies, now available in paperback for the first time.
Review
"Nesbit has done an admirable, thorough job of research."--Slavic and East European Journal, Winter 2005
Synopsis
Savage Junctures provides fresh insights into Eisenstein's films and writings. It examines the multiple contexts within which his films evolved and Eisenstein's appropriation of world cultures as his sources. Nesbet focuses on the possibilities of visual image making and each chapter addresses the problem of his image-based thinking from a different perspective. Each chapter also offers a fundamentally new interpretation of the films and writings that make up his oeuvre. This is a major new contribution to studies in Soviet cinema and culture and to the field of film studies.
Synopsis
One of the iconic figures of the twentieth-century cinema, Sergei Eisenstein is best known as the director of The Battleship Potemkin, Alexander Nevskii and Ivan the Terrible. His craft as director and film editor left a distinct mark on such key figures of the Western cinema as Nicolas Roeg, Francis Ford Coppola,and#160; Sam Peckinpah and Akiro Kurosawa. This comprehensive volume is the first-ever English-language edition of Eisensteinand#8217;s newly discovered notes for a general history of the cinema, a project he undertook in 1946-47 before his death in 1948. In his writings, Eisenstein presents the main coordinates of a history of the cinema without mentioning specific directors or films: whatand#160; we find instead is a vast genealogy of all the media and of all the art forms that have preceded cinemaand#8217;s birth and accompanied the first decades of its history, exploring the same expressive possibilities that cinema has explored and responding to the same, deeply rooted, urges that cinema has responded to. and#160;Eisensteinand#8217;s texts are followed by a commentary by some of the worldand#8217;s experts on the Russian cinema.
Synopsis
One of the iconic directors of twentieth-century cinema, Sergei Eisenstein is best known for films such as
The Battleship Potemkin,
Alexander Nevskii, and
Ivan the Terrible. His work, in turn, has inspired other great moviemakers, including Akira Kurosawa and Francis Ford Coppola.
This is the first English-language edition of Eisensteinand#8217;s recently discovered notes for a general history of the cinema, a project he undertook in the years before his death in 1948. He presents a vast genealogy of the various media and art forms that preceded cinemaand#8217;s birth and accompanied the first decades of its history. Critical essays by eminent Eisenstein scholars follow his texts. Comprehensive and illuminating, this volume offers unique access to the writings of a pioneering figure in cinema.
About the Author
Naum Kleiman is director of the Film Museum in Moscow, director of the Eisenstein Center, and an actor and filmmaker. Antonio Somaini is professor of film and visual culture studies at the University of Venice in Italy.
Table of Contents
General Editor's Preface - Preface & Acknowledgments - Note on Transliteration - Introduction - Beyond Recognition:
Strike and the Eye of the Abattoir - Fourth-Dimensional Medusa:
Battleship Potemkin and the Construction of the Soviet Cinema Audience - Picture-Thinking:
October and the Debris of Philosophy - Excavating
The General Line: The Pleasures and Perils of Accumulation - Savage Thinking: The Sublime Surfaces of Eisenstein's Mexico - The Skeleton Dance: Animation, Terror and the Musical Comedy - Beyond Pleasure:
Ivan and the 'Juncture of Beginning and End' - Conclusion: The Shape of Thinking - Notes - Bibliography - Index