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I know people talk highly about the Soviet directors, but aren't the early ones basically propagandists?
by bingohbangoh 5y ago
I know people talk highly about the Soviet directors, but aren't the early ones basically propagandists?
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- blacksmith_tb 5y agoWell, Eisenstein[1] comes to mind, I don't think it'd be fair to call his work only propaganda, even if some of it has those overtones. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sergei_Eisenstein https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sergei_Eisenstein
- patrec 5y agoThe Bolsheviks and (to a lesser extent) the Nazis had plenty of good art that also saved as propaganda for the most despicable causes. You can appreciate Eisenstein or Harlan as great directors without thinking them to be fine human beings. Of course beyond art that is purely formally fascinating, there is a tension between artistic quality and serving a narrow propagandist agenda, and personally I find Battleship Potemkin utterly dull and overrated. But the best films these directors created in the service of totalitarianism transcend this narrowness: try Ivan the Terrible, for the example.
- dontlaugh 5y agoAre today's films about the US army, intelligence and police not propaganda?
- bingohbangoh 5y agoeven the ones that are unambiguously negative?