Sergei Eisenstein: The Artist in Service of the Revolution

Abstract

IN ALEXANDER SOLZHENITSYN's One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich (1962), the classic account of life in the Soviet labor camps of the gulag, two prisoners argue the artistic merits of Soviet film maker Sergei Eisenstein (1898-1948). One, a director who was arrested before he could make his first film, maintains that whether or not one agrees with the political ideology of Eisenstein, it is impossible to deny his genius in such cinematic works as Battleship Potemkin (1925). His fellow prisoner begs to differ, observing that the true mark of greatness lies on the moral plane with truth, and Eisenstein, in service of his master Stalin, fails to pass the test. Thus, the most celebrated moralist and novelist of twentieth century Russian letters addressed the problems of artistic life in the Soviet Union. While the choices made by Solzhenitsyn resulted in clashes with the Soviet regime and his eventual exile to the West, Eisenstein celebrated the Bolshevik Revolution as freeing the artist from the restraints of bourgeoisie nationalism. However, the talented film director ended up being at the mercy of Joseph Stalin's system which sabotaged Eisenstein's work and intimidated the artist. Does the political subservience to Stalin deny Eisenstein his position as one of the great artists of the twentieth century as Solzhenitsyn seems to suggest in Ivan Denisovich? Perhaps a brief survey of the life and work of Eisenstein will