Sergei Eisenstein

MODULE:
Techniques of montage allow filmmakers to be more efficient. A technique can be re-used in multiple films; its re-usability saves time because it needs only be found once but can be used many times throughout the filmmaker’s career.

There are parts of Jaws that suggest what Eisenstein might have done if he hadn’t intellectualized himself out of reach—if he’d given in to the bourgeois child in himself. (Kael 691)

1. For Sergei Eisenstein, montage holds the key to all cinema. Of his many descriptions of montage, the following fits my use of the term best: “montage is characterized . . . by collision. By the conflict of two pieces in opposition to each other”(37). Montage juxtaposes shots that differ distinctly from one another. These elements, united because they collide, lead to meaning in cinema. Such was Eisenstein’s approach.

2. In his many pieces on the subject, Eisenstein evaluated the effect of montage on himself and on audiences. He sought to make a science it, to find a system for emotion, to codify intellectual cinema. For instance, he suggested that different “methods of montage” enable different manipulations of the audience. These methods (Metric, Rhythmic, Tonal, Overtonal, and Intellectual) give the filmmaker different levels of control over audience reactions, “outbursts,” and—with “Intellectual montage”—even thoughts (72-83). While Eisenstein does not suggest that one might easily and objectively measure the effect of a given shot, his work implies that a skilled filmmaker can control his viewer’s responses to his films.

3. There are three reasons Eisenstein studied montage and its effects. One is artistic—the filmmaker cultivated his own understanding of cinema; he learned how the medium can be manipulated and shared that knowledge with other filmmakers. His research is also pedagogical. Eisenstein explains how films should be made, a goal that fits Soviet politics of the 1920s and its need for skilled party filmmakers. Finally, Eisenstein codified his theories of montage and cinematography to help understand cinema rationally; he devised systems for making cinema produce specific results. In striking similarity to Ford and Taylor’s rationalization of labor, Eisenstein seeks to scientifically codify and rationalize cinema.

4. In “The Structure of the Film,” Eisenstein argues that Battleship Potemkin’s effectiveness stems from two places, the film’s “organic-ness” and its “pathos.” He examines how the film is produced “organically” and how it produces pathos in its scenes and viewers.

In its five acts, tied with the general thematic line of revolutionary brotherhood, there is otherwise little that is similar externally. But in one respect they are absolutely alike: each part is distinctly broken into two almost equal halves. This can be seen with particular clarity from the second act on…. And it should be further noted that the transition within each part is not merely a transition to a merely different mood, to a merely different rhythm, to a merely different event, but each time the transition is to a sharply opposite quality. (165)

Each act of Potemkin splits around a “caesura” with opposing qualities on either side. The two halves of each act contrast and produce pathos. The essay suggests that pathos in cinema is both codifiable and universal; Eisenstein makes little reference to the fact that different people might react differently to the same film. He describes emotions and responses as though they are universal.

5. Eisenstein’s techniques justify Thalberg’s search for a system to make the perfect film. Perhaps Thalberg should have researched Eisenstein’s pathos modules. A look at well-known screenwriters handbooks still in use today might suggest that such techniques are not as laughable as they first appear. The fractal use of modularity in cinema suggests modular montage as a composition style suited to new media. [Academia] [Film Studies] [Grammatology] [Media Tech]