Battleship Potemkin review

 Number 318 on the top 1000 films of all time is Sergei Eisenstein's 1925 silent film 'Battleship Potemkin.'

In the backdrop of the Russian revolution, sailor Vakulinchuk (Aleksandr Antonov) leads a mutiny against the tyrannical officers of the Battleship Potemkin. He and his fellow sailors sail into Odessa as heroes, but the revolution is only beginning.

Battleship Potemkin received acclaim from historical and contemporary critics. Unlike some other films of the era e.g All Quiet on the Western Front, it has held up well over the years.

One thing that struck me was how Eisenstein never shied away from depicting the brutality of the revolution. Within the famous scene of the massacre on the Odessa Steps, we witness these horrors in unflinching detail. Two key scenes come to mind - a little boy who has been shot by a Cossack, blood pouring from his head, and a woman who has a bullet-hole where her eye should be. They were powerful scenes.

This was shocking at the time, and it was especially shocking to see it in a silent film in an era dominated by the likes of Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton.

But I'm going to slightly demur from popular critical opinion. The massacre on the Odessa steps is considered one of the film's highlights. While it was good, I would argue that it went on for so long that any dramatic tension became severely diluted. There are only so many times that we can watch people run away. The film is only sixty-seven minutes long, but if it wasn't for this overly-drawn out sequence, it could have been shorter.

Yes, it is a propaganda film, but Battleship Potemkin did serve as an early reminder of the power of cinema.

The Kite Runner review

 Number 655 on the top 1000 films of all time is Marc Foster's 2007 adaptation of the Kite Runner based on Khaled Hosseini's novel of the same name.

Amir (Zekeria Ebrahimi) is a Pashto boy living in pre-soviet Afghanistan. His best friend is also his servant Hassan - a Hazara, (Ahmad Khan Mahmoodzada) who is an expert in the game of kite-running. After the soviets invade, Amir and his father flee to the US. Twenty years later, Amir (Khallid Abdalla) returns to a taliban-led Afghanistan to right the wrongs of his past.

I read this book in 2022. It was a powerful and harrowing read. But the film was incredibly underwhelming. I'm disappointed to stay this, but the film lacked the same emotional pathos. 

*spoilers ahead*

There are three harrowing stand-out scene in the book - Hassan's rape by Assef - an older Pashto boy, the stoning in the stadium and the final confrontation between an adult Amir and Assef. What should have been three brutally-honest scenes highlighting the sad reality of living in Afghanistan were little more than damp squibs. The emotional beats completely failed to land.

Perhaps that's due to the film's 12-rating. Maybe if it was fifteen or eighteen, it could have shown a lot more, and thus been more devastating to watch. But the 12 rating hampered it into either rushing or glossing over the most important scenes.

For example, Hassan and Amir win a kite-fighting competition. Hassan runs to collect the fallen kite as a prize for Amir. But Assef and his gang corner him and demand the kite. Hassan refuses. Assef rapes him. This is depicted mostly through allusion and some choice close-ups, but it is rushed, and thus the pathos didn't land. I'm not saying we needed to see a graphic depiction of the rape a la Oz or the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, but they could have taken it further. Although I acknowledge this would have been problematic with the young actors.

As such, fearing for reprisals against the young actors, Paramount relocated them to the UAE, fully prepared to pay for them to grow up there. But Mahmoodzada had to return to Afghanistan due to visa issues. There he received death threats from both the Pashto and Hazara communities, and he had to seek asylum in Sweden.

Anyway, I would also make the same point about the final fight between an adult Assef and Amir. Again, it felt rushed without anytime for the emotions land. And I think this was a big faux pas considering this was such a climatic moment in the film. If anything the most emotional points came into the quicker scenes like after the rape Hassan returns to Amir still holding the kite. That was so sad.

But none of this criticism should be directed to the cast. Ebrahimi was very good as the adult Amir. He had to walk a fine line of a guilty man atoning for his past sins and a saviour saving Afghan children from a line of wretchery - a comparison aptly made within the film itself.

Perhaps I've been biased by reading the book first. If I had seen the film first maybe I would have left feeling more impressed. While it isn't inherently a bad film, it could have been a lot better.