Soviet Montage

This Russian film movement began in 1924/25 and lasted till the early 1930’s. Only a small amount of movies were made, about 30, but they were extremely influential. Eisenstein’s strike (1925) was the most successful movie made by Sergei Eisenstein, the most recognised director of the Soviet Montage.

Soviet History and Film Production

In 1917 Russia suffered two extremely big revolutions, in February, eliminating the Tsar’s government, and in October, when the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was created. Narkompros, the Minister of culture, controlled the film industry.

Narkompros created, in 1919, the State School of Film. A year later, Lev Kuleshov joined the school and began to explore the importance of editing in a film, developing the main idea of the Montage theory and style. He believed that the viewer’s response to the movie was based in the editing, and not on an individual shot. He saw film as the most important art, and as an effective medium for propaganda and education.

Montage

One main characteristic of Soviet Montage films is the downplaying of individual characters in the center of attention. Single characters are shown as members of different social classes and are representing a general type or class. In Eisenstein's Strike there is only one character named individually in the entire film. Another characteristic is that Soviet Montage filmmakers often chose strikes and other clashes in the history of revolutions e.g. Eisenstein's Potemkin, October and Strike.

The central aspect of Soviet Montage style was the area of editing. Cuts should stimulate the spectator. In opposition to continuity editing Montage cutting often created either overlapping or elliptical temporal relations. Overlapping editing means, that the second shot repeats part or all of the action from the previous shot. Through repetitions of this method the time an action takes on the screen expands. Elliptical cutting creates the opposite effect. A part of an action is left out, so the event takes less time than it would in reality. Elliptical editing was often used in the form of the jump cut. In Strike, Eisenstein cuts from a police officer to a butcher who kills an animal in the form of a jump cut.

The butcher is not part of the story but should make the viewer think about the connection and come to a conclusion such as: the workers were slaughtered like animals. The butcher is here a nondiegetic element. Anything that is part of the film story world is diegetic. A nondiegetic element exists outside the story world. There is no connection between the slaughter of the animal. The use of such nondiegetic shots was central to Eisenstein's theory on "intellectual montage". Intellectual montage creates its effects through conflict such as the juxtaposing of shots that have no direct connection. Soviet Montage filmmakers often shot on location. Strike, in fact, was shot in a real factory. The machine and the factory became symbols of the new society in this time.

Source: http://cinetext.philo.at/reports/sv.html

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Influence of Soviet Montage on Modern Cinema:

A movie that follows the characteristics of a soviet montage film is Psycho (Hitchcock 1960)

Hitchcock uses a lot of non continuos editing, and makes a sequence that as one shot that is not related to the previous shot, he also includes shots that portray what the character is looking. 

Our own version of Soviet Montage

Shot 1: the teacher is starting the lesson.

Shot 2: the responsible student is paying attention to the class.

Shot 3: some students are still walking around the school.

Shot 4: The teacher is sill teaching to the one student who wants to listen.

Shot 5: The student does not really understand the lesson.

Close reading of 'The Birds' (Hitchcock 1963)

1. Note the details of each attack: who is attacked, and why. When is the first attack? What happens? When do the audience first know an attack is coming? How is the moment foreshadowed? 

During the first attack Melanie is in the boat, very near the shore after taking the lovebirds to Mitch’s house, when a seagull appears and attacks her. On the majority of the attacks, there is a very peaceful mood, but a sudden ‘chatering’ of birds breaks the tension being generated, and then the birds attack.

3. Write a one sentence description of the protagonists:

Mitch: a man who is trying to maintain balance between the two worlds in which he lives, his job in San Francisco, and his family in Bodega Bay.

Melanie: Young, wealthy, socialite form San Francisco who uses Mitch as a distraction and a way to have fun, until the birds begin to attack.

Lydia: An over-protective mother who is willing to do everything for her children, because she is afraid to be abandoned again, after her husband died, a couple of days ago.

Annie: Mitch’s ex-girlfriend, who never had a very good relationship with Lydia, but is still very fond of Mitch

4. How does Hitchcock build tension through editing in the school yard scene? 

The brilliant editing in Hitchcock’s movie is constantly changing shots and angles, giving different perspectives, therefore creating tension. In the school yard scene, the audience sees the kids faces, their feet running away from the birds, and their backs, as they run away.

7. Can you work out what triggers the attacks?

Melanie is present in all the attacks, so it is possible to say that her presence triggers the attacks.