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The Film List Project Week #11: Battleship Potemkin

So this movie is totally holiday appropriate. Not.

I have to admit something. This is the first movie I've watched for the blog that I've not totally understood. And that's okay. I'm not going to understand every movie I watch after one viewing. This may be one I revisit and come back to later.

I will say that Battleship Potemkin, a 1925 silent Soviet propaganda film by Sergei Eisenstein, was fascinating to me.

I've discovered over the last few months that I really enjoy silent films. Granted, the others I've seen are works by Buster Keaton and Charles Chaplin with a very different tone than Potemkin, but I still think the absence of sound can amplify the message of a film.

A silent film also relies on music, which I love. Though the musical score usually changes over time, any score with a silent film really makes the audience remember why music is important to a film's message.

What I did get out of this film about mutiny and massacre was a message of the importance of both a group of people and an individual. A small group can sway a larger one to its way of thinking, and an individual is needed not only to be the voice in a crowd, but also to represent the humanity of an issue.

A scene in the film in which a mother carries her injured son up the Odessa steps and toward the shooting imperial guards shows the bravery and unconditional love of a mother. That's one of the greatest things about film: while you may be lost in the crowd in real life, on film you get highlight one person in that crowd, eliciting a powerful, emotional response from the audience.

In honor of Christmas, I'm going to try and watch a couple of lighthearted movies next week (hopefully). Stay tuned...

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