The New Babylon (1929)
(Novyy Vavilon)
Country: USSR
Technical: bw 80m silent (music by Shostakovich)
Director: Leonid Trauberg, Grigori Kozintsev
Cast: Yelena Kuzmina, Pyotr Sobelevsky, Sophie Magarill
Synopsis:
1871, France: two lovers find themselves on opposing sides, she a salesgirl in a bourgeois department store who joins the Paris Commune, he a soldier tasked with repressing it.
Review:
Efficient and grotesquely creative, but unengaging, propaganda piece. The images are never dull but the characters don't really take hold, due to the makers' concern for set pieces of montage rather than narrative. And let's be honest, they could not really afford to favour the human story at the expense of the political morality tale.
(Novyy Vavilon)
Country: USSR
Technical: bw 80m silent (music by Shostakovich)
Director: Leonid Trauberg, Grigori Kozintsev
Cast: Yelena Kuzmina, Pyotr Sobelevsky, Sophie Magarill
Synopsis:
1871, France: two lovers find themselves on opposing sides, she a salesgirl in a bourgeois department store who joins the Paris Commune, he a soldier tasked with repressing it.
Review:
Efficient and grotesquely creative, but unengaging, propaganda piece. The images are never dull but the characters don't really take hold, due to the makers' concern for set pieces of montage rather than narrative. And let's be honest, they could not really afford to favour the human story at the expense of the political morality tale.
(Novyy Vavilon)
Country: USSR
Technical: bw 80m silent (music by Shostakovich)
Director: Leonid Trauberg, Grigori Kozintsev
Cast: Yelena Kuzmina, Pyotr Sobelevsky, Sophie Magarill
Synopsis:
1871, France: two lovers find themselves on opposing sides, she a salesgirl in a bourgeois department store who joins the Paris Commune, he a soldier tasked with repressing it.
Review:
Efficient and grotesquely creative, but unengaging, propaganda piece. The images are never dull but the characters don't really take hold, due to the makers' concern for set pieces of montage rather than narrative. And let's be honest, they could not really afford to favour the human story at the expense of the political morality tale.