ChanBot i must have seen a different film!!

VeteranLight I don't have all the words right now but this film is a work of art.

Baseshment I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

AutCuddly Great movie! If you want to be entertained and have a few good laughs, see this movie. The music is also very good,

DonAlberto After watching Battleship Potemkin I realized straight away I'd made a great purchase. Its reputation as a masterpiece, one that must be pass down from one generation to another is well deserved. People singing its praises are always banging on the idea of this mute film conveying a wide set of emotions that even the best talkies can't even dream of. Now I understand why. Not having a voice to use, actors must draw on their bodies and faces in order to make the viewers sad, happy or whatever emotions or feelings they want them, us to feel. And I promise you, this film is a roller-coaster as emotions are concerned. The story centers around the events that took place during the Russian Revolution and the central role the Battleship Potemkin played in it. I wouldn't like to get carried away and say that the historical facts aren't important to the narrative because the make up its core, but my recommendation is to shift one's focus from the story to the characters. I'm sure you won't regret it.

dougdoepke It's sixty-six minutes of perhaps the most arresting imagery in movie history, also one of the most dynamic. Every shot includes movement of some kind, whether people, smoke, guns, or the prow of history overtaking us. There's no scene of focal conversation, let alone silent talk. Thus politics of revolt remain largely unregistered. Instead the symbolism of rotten meat force-fed to sailors sums up crumbling Tsarist rule. The revolt is told in compelling movement, crowds rushing to and fro, Tsarist forces ahead or behind. One after another, the human wave cascades, with hardly time to breathe. Surely, the Odessa Steps is one of the most memorable in all moviedom; at the same time, a common humanity is deepened-- the dead baby, the shattered eyeglasses. Yes, the 1905 revolt failed. But seed was planted taking down Tsarist rule but ten years later. No need to go on—the film's brilliance is there for all to see, and remains so though not a word is spoken. It's Eisenstein's masterpiece, an enduring one-of-a-kind.

Michael Morrison As is true with so many films, silent and sound both, "Battleship Potemkin" gains classic, indeed iconic, status very much because of the accompanying score.I have seen "Battleship Potemkin" several times, including a (I think) tenth-year anniversary edition with a new score, and one I remember very admiringly. (I saw it in a film class at Los Angeles Valley College.)However, on the night of 13 November 2016, Turner Classic Movies presented "Battleship Potemkin" with what is billed as the original 1926 score, "newly recorded."Magnificent!Extraordinary!The pounding beat accelerates with the action, matching perfectly with what is seen, and urging the audience into edge-of-the seat anticipation.As many times as I have seen, and been enthralled by, "Battleship Potemkin," I do not remember seeing the one colorized shot. It is, yes, part of the communist propaganda, but actually adds to the drama of the movie.Bear in mind, please, that my earliest years included membership in Young Americans for Freedom, as well as a dose of common sense, so even the greatest communist propaganda finds no fertile soil in my heart or mind. But every time I see "Battleship Potemkin" I am tempted, however briefly, to seek out a CPUSA membership form.Director Sergei Eisenstein proclaimed his admiration of D.W. Griffith and never hesitated to credit Griffith with having taught him the art and skill of editing."Battleship Potemkin" uses editing in part to propagandize, but more so to advance the story.In addition to skilled and dramatic editing, Eisenstein used a brilliant moving camera, especially at The Steps (if you haven't seen this before, I don't want to give anything away, but you'll see quickly what I mean) to, again, tell the story, but to tell it in so dramatic a fashion, any thoughtful person, and even just the person seeking a movie to relax and enjoy, will be caught up and moved and excited and fascinated.Eisenstein was his own editor, and this was only his second feature film, and that he was a rare genius is immediately obvious.Bear in mind this was financed by the Soviet government, for its own purposes, so Eisenstein's huge crowds and the availability of the Soviet navy are understood, but they help make this one of the greatest movies of all time.As propaganda, "Battleship Potemkin" is occasionally obvious, even blatant, but as a movie, it is simply -- to repeat -- one of the greatest of all time.I cannot stress too much how strongly I recommend "Battleship Potemkin."Probably there are several versions around for home consumption, but do try to see the one with the enhanced original score. Composer Edmund Meisel has very little information given about him at TCM, but there is a Wikipedia article on him here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edmund_MeiselProbably Turner Classic Movies will present this again, and I'm hoping it will be available On Demand. Please, for your own enjoyment and edification, do try to watch it.

Steve Pulaski NOTE: This is not a conventional review; this is my required response to Sergei Eisenstein's Battleship Potemkin for my college course Intro to Film & Screen Studies...Cinema, both domestic and foreign, owes a lot to Sergei Eisenstein for creating not only one of the most successful propaganda films with Battleship Potemkin, but one of the most successful examples of montage in history. Eisenstein employs a wide variety of subversive montage styles here, some considered tonal ones that string together a continuous feeling that rubs off on an audience, some for the purpose of continuity and consistency in events, and some for the purpose of putting grandiose, large-scale sequences into a specified perspective, though all significant in their own right.One of the most jarring inclusions of structurally conflicting shots is the famous shot of the statue of the lion, which is shown sleeping, awakening, and rising all in the matter of about two seconds. These static images, when strung together, inspire the kind of momentary shock we, the audience, have upon watching Eisenstein concoct a film so raucous and battle-hungry that it's as if the lion is replicating our personal feelings whilst watching the film. The conflict established is more or less a circumstance of reactionary response to the disobedience of order; order which is constantly affirmed throughout the entire first chapter of the film.Then there's the scene in the second chapter where the passengers aboard Potemkin begin to rebel. Eisenstein utilizes his montage theory to establish the events occurring before zeroing in on specific people fighting and specific blows in a way that shows the conflict between the two parties whilst showing a more concise focus on a large-scale playing field. The effect is unique because it's rare we see a large battle (or even a large battle conducted in a small area) specified so humanly by way of close-ups and intimate shooting techniques that Eisenstein employs that make the sequence so personal.As far as alternative logic goes – where Eisenstein creates some sort of visual poetry or distinction without the use of his beloved montage technique – there's the scene early in the film where one of the captains goes to observe the actions in the bunkers. Eisenstein's camera observes the actions of the captain while interjecting cuts of pots and pans precariously placed atop boards of wood that are strung up and suspended to the room's ceiling. These scenes establish what the captain is looking at and what his environment is composed of in a manner that relates greatly to Kulesov and his own personal effect.Then there are scenes that are more concerned with fleshing out a specific event, rather than encapsulating the horror and the messiness of other events (the uprising aboard the Potemkin and the famous Odessa Steps sequence just to name a few). One scene is the final straw for the workers, of sorts, when they are persuaded to believe that rotting, maggot-ridden meat is okay for consumption, despite being viewed by everybody on board, even the cooks, as otherwise. Eisenstein keeps things grounded more-or-less in a real-time here, allowing his camera to go back and forth between the workers and the captains in a manner that doesn't shortchange or rapidly look for a way out of this event in order to interject other scenes and create a compilation of "last straws" for the workers. This scene in particular establishes the logic that Eisenstein uses can be equal parts broadly observant, as seen in his montages, or decidedly focused.In a way, I feel Battleship Potemkin was a film made for the masses to, for once, look introspectively at their situations in Russian and observe the treacherous, unfair living conditions and the willfully oppressive nature of the rich and able. Eisenstein had to combat the fact that most of the commonwealth Russian population was illiterate and unknowing of their own exploitation, which made him make a film like this that, despite being able to be dissected in numerous ways, almost demands a response of any kind. The complete and total disregard for the health and wellbeing of humans should at least warrant some response from people, and Eisenstein's images reflect the horrors of oppression without getting lost in symbolism or any kind of discernible auteurism. His montage elements only add to a film, rather than being stylistic distractions that work to muddle the themes at hand.Starring: Aleksandr Antonov, Vladimir Barksy, and Grigori Aleksandrov. Directed by: Sergei Eisenstein.