The film recounts major events in the formation of the Russian Empire in the 16th century. Ivan the Terrible of the Grand Duchy of Moscow, backed by a strong regular army, implemented a series of positive domestic reforms and foreign policies, hit the feudal aristocracy hard, conquered the surrounding neighboring countries, expanded its borders, and gained access to the Baltic Sea. Build a centralized power across Europe and Asia.
Director Eisenstein did not simply reproduce historical facts, but tried to express the historical era and the activities of the Tsar in a complete and profound way with artistic techniques. This treatment is entirely for the purpose of clearly expressing the sharp contradictions of the times, revealing the characteristic meaning of Lei Di's image, their fierce inner conflict, and highlighting the progressive tendency of all his activities and the tragic fate of his individual. The director believes that the basic task of the film "should show the character development process of great historical figures". Lei Di's story should be about "a carefree teenager turned into an autocratic monarch who is exhausted from the struggle but as determined as steel", and about "the intrigue of the upper classes, their suppression and weakening". When the director expresses the character development process of Ivan, who is reforming according to the inevitability of history and the requirements of life itself, he makes the lonely Leidi doubt the path he has chosen, and falls into a tragic inner conflict, thus endowing the image with lifelikeness. human characteristics. In order to maintain the power of tradition and vested interests, the church increasingly colluded closely with the nobles, opposed the reforms promoted by Ivan, and conspired to put him to death. Ivan is forced to resort to bloody violence and declare war on the nobles and the church. Although he became an autocratic monarch who ruled the world, he ended up being a loner.
The plot, performance, styling, music, everything in the film is subordinate to the tragic contradiction of Lei Di's image. Never before in an Eisenstein film has there been such a complete plot, such a deep, exciting and colorful performance. In the modeling handling of the second episode, he surpassed his previous level, making the film very expressive in terms of overall structure and details, reaching a new and brilliant peak.
Eisenstein has always been known worldwide for his kinetic-based experiments, but his "Ivan the Terrible" was unconventional, happening "in a near-still tense atmosphere," It's as exciting as a corpse in action." Here, the characters are depicted in a mythic oracle way. Each character exudes Greek tragic passion, each face has the characteristics of a mask, each movement is essentially symbolic, every detail is exaggerated like a kabuki movement, and the characters appear from It's normal to walk down the murals. The audience feels only a bystander to the intrigue and strife played by these men and women. Some critics believe that this is an unparalleled film, an opera, and a patriotic epic that can only be fully understood by reading all the author's articles together.
As a master with outstanding talent and extraordinary film imagination, Eisenstein focused almost all his creative explorations on the processing of the film's modeling and the expressiveness of the pictures. The entire "Ivan the Terrible" is divided into several expressive scenes, and the character dialogue is also stylized to obey the style of the entire film. The entire historical feature, action atmosphere, character relationship and psychological state of the film are expressed with the help of profoundly conceived modeling methods and the vivid music of the composer Prokofiev.
Eisenstein relied on the skills of two outstanding cinematographers, Moskvin and Kissai, and the help of veteran artist Spinel, to make the film's styling treatments exceptionally artistic. Cumbersome wine glasses, cast iron pitchers, eccentric lampstands, gilded plates, brocade vestments, furnishings of the inner palace, symbols of kingship, classroom books and utensils, portraits of saints, heavy candlesticks, cast Animal-patterned cannons, chariot tents, bows and flags, all handled with great skill and impeccable artistic aesthetics. With these props, Eisenstein makes people feel the experience of the characters in the play, but also expresses his own attitude towards the event. For example, when the young tsar learned of a fire along the Moskva River at his wedding, the drastic change in his mental state was not only revealed by the actors' performances and dialogues, but also by the use of props. At this moment, the neatly arranged symmetrical gilded swans held high by the servants suddenly swayed, as if they were frightened and fled in all directions.
The shots showing Ivan among the people in the film have been carefully conceived in terms of composition and lighting. In the shot on the palace stairs, the tsar seems to be at one with the people, and at the same time, his white figure, which seems to be soaring, is set off by the black crowd surrounding him. The few shots at the end of the first episode are very novel. In the foreground is Ivan's clear, vulture-like face profile portrayed by light. Ivan looked out from the cannon, and the distant view was a wasteland, and the people of Moscow came to him in long lines to petition. In this shot, the courtyard wall that separated him from the people seemed to collapse suddenly, and people poured into the monastery where the tsar was hiding. The unforgettable portrait of the tsar makes the audience feel the people draw close to him, the great strength he gains from the support of the people.
In the film, almost all the mise-en-scene is designed with precision and expressiveness. For example, the scene before Anastasia's death is a fine example of directing skill. Here Eisenstein successfully uses almost all of the cinematic expression. From the depths of the semi-dark temple came the chorus of songs, Ivan sadly guarded the coffin, and Malyuda gloomily reported to him the news of the aristocratic betrayal. The candles flickered and the monks sang prayer hymns. In this complex sculptural and acoustic background, Ivan's external gestures and the "inner monologue" embodied by scriptures and the three lines of mundane affairs represented by Maruuda are intertwined to form a very unique sound-picture scroll. .
In the second episode, on the one hand, the conflict between Ivan and the nobles is described, and the conspiracy against him becomes more intricate, and on the other hand, Ivan's inner conflict is subjectively explored. Loneliness leads to painful doubts that underlie the tragic contradictions of Lei Di's image. Superman's anguish writhes inside Ivan, sometimes paralyzing his will, which in turn drives him to pursue his unifying goal with more brutal means in the next step. Ivan in history was both a great monarch who unified Russia and a tyrant forced to use brutal violence. The idea that his destiny is destined to come into conflict with the Orthodox Church, which protects the interests of the nobles. The second episode reveals the philosophical conflict between the mystical intuition of man as an instrument of God and the church's manipulative manipulation of rituals to preserve tradition and the power of vested interests. The thread of a long-planned conspiracy by the church and the nobles, intertwined with Ivan's need to escape his extreme loneliness, propels the plot forward.
Eisenstein presents this conflict in a very peculiar way of play. For example, the church performed a biblical drama in the cathedral where Ivan was crowned, insinuating that the Tsar was a heretic and urging him to repent. Ivan's attempts to reconcile with Archbishop Philip failed, and he was forced to declare war on the Church and the nobility. What follows is the climax of the film: the nobles conspire to assassinate the Tsar, who is replaced by Vladimir. Ivan invited the "future heir" to the banquet, and personally directed a good show of stealing. There is a strong stylized atmosphere shrouded in this paragraph, which focuses on rendering Ivan's teasing of Vladimir. Everyone is deceived by their role in life, and Ivan plays with everyone like a mouse. The performance, music and styling in this scene are of a high level and rich in expressiveness. Among them, the scenes of the Guards feasting and dancing were deliberately shot in color, with gold, red and black symbolizing power, struggle and death, which accurately reflected the tense atmosphere of conspiracy and murder at this time, giving people an ominous atmosphere. Expect to get a high degree of emotional rendering.
The epilogue of the second episode after The Last Judgment is expressed through a ballad that is suggestive of a combination of sound and picture. A scene at Windsor Palace shows Ivan's envoys, the German ambassador and the Queen of England playing a diplomatic chess game. The game changes abruptly and rapidly, interspersed with scenes of Kurbsky and the King of Livonia falling into Ivan's trap.
The use of performance to create artistic images in the film is rare, but the actors still leave a deep impression on people. Eisenstein demanded that the dramatic content be expressed as fully and expressively as possible, creating extremely vivid and vivid mise-en-scène and portraiture. He used a lot of close-ups, making them an organic part of the structure of the sculpt and montage. Cherkassov, the popular actor who played Ivan, showed rich connotations. He revealed the tsar's inner world of doubt, depression, loneliness and violence to the fullest. His superb acting reaches the heights of true tragedy.
However, the emotional tension in the film is more obtained through the means of modeling and music. For example, in the grand scene of the coronation of the Tsar, there are almost no actors. All this is achieved not by the performance of the actors, but by the very expressive panorama of the cathedral, the multiple portrait shots, the chorus and the increasingly loud voice of the abbot. During the anointing ceremony, a series of portraits of monks, the expressive portrait of Ivan with his head thrown back in the illness, the stark contrast between the monks' white robes and the almost black portraits of the saints, creates made a strong impression.
Music has also become an extremely important dramatization factor and modeling means for the film. The famous composer Prokofiev was amazed by Eisenstein's temperament and his ability to succinctly state his intentions to the composer, in Eisenstein's words, "music must be like a mother tearing up her own son" . Ivan's theme is presented on the screen at the beginning of the epic with a song that symbolizes "The Storm is Coming". Before the plot unfolds, the song climaxes with the line, "The clouds are raging, the dawn is drenched in crimson blood. On the corpse of the enemy, the Russians are united." And in the last paragraph of the first episode, it echoes the overture with a new quality. At this time, Ivan's theme appeared again, "The storm is coming..." Ivan, who grew up through a lonely and fearful tortuous road, resolutely expressed his will: "The voice of the people is the voice of God! I put The sword of God's vengeance is clenched in the hands..." This theme continues in the orchestral music. According to the review, "the music fills the film with a parallel, evolving effect of an emotional sound". The cooperation of these two masters has created a successful example in the history of international film art.
The whole "Ivan the Terrible" permeates the profound inner experience of Eisenstein's life. Through careful study he concluded that people like Ivan were forced to act in order to survive that were not bound by traditional notions of "good" and "evil." He finally fully realized what he said in 1929: "It is the task of art to express the contradictions of existence." The film brought this talented artist to an unprecedented artistic peak.
The conception and filming preparations for the third episode of the film have already taken shape, but since Eisenstein died shortly after the second episode (1948), he left an irreparable gap in world film history.
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