#ivan the terrible 1958

[em0hamlet]

It's morbin time

[filmap]

Иван Грозный / Ivan The Terrible, Part II: The Boyars' Plot Sergei Eisenstein. 1958

Church Ascension Church. Andropova Ave, д. 39, стр. 1, Kolomenskoye, Moscow, Russia, 115487 See in map

See in imdb

[dromerace]

Ivan the Terrible Part II: The Boyars’ Plot, Sergei Eisenstein, 1958.

[jasonsutekh]

Ivan the Terrible Part 1 (1944) and 2 (1958)

The Russian Czar who united the nation fights against the boyars and landowners to control the country by any means.

 The political intrigue is the main focus of the film and some of it is interesting, mainly the betrayals from all the title character’s closest allies and the underhand ways they all try to undermine each other. It’s a fairly traditional story but amusing enough to follow. The war scenes were particularly impressive thanks to the large number of extras.

 There are some scenes where it makes it feel like the Russian language is long-winded or repetitive but this is probably more the result of bureaucratic representation; if so it’s realistic. Another aspect that was a little more prominent than it needed to be was the constant glaring, at points it felt like half the communication was done in giving the evil eye.

 Much of the aesthetic aspects were engaging and entertaining. The background imagery was complex at times and added to the subtext on occasion, the use of shadows made some scenes feel larger and combined the background with the foreground, the colour scenes were particularly unusual but worked very well both for the connotations and basic amusement due to the intricate dancing.

 At several points it became apparent that the propaganda was going to be incredibly unsubtle, there was even children in the second one openly calling him out in song. It was originally supposed to be a trilogy but production was interrupted by actual political intrigue, ironically. The second part was delayed so long because Stalin felt the criticism of Ivan was veiled criticism of his own despotic nature, so the release had to wait for his death.

 Ivan the Terrible Part 1: 3/10 -This one’s bad but it’s got some good in it, just there-

 Ivan the Terrible Part 2: 4/10 -It’s below average, but only just!-

 -When the second part was confiscated the third ceased production, the script, set designs, and some film fragments still exist.

-The stock used for the colour scenes was captured in Soviet occupied Germany.

-Filming for the second part was completed in 1949 and release delayed until 1958.

[welldonekhushi]

I watched "The Idiot" (1958) based on Dostoevsky's novels, and after finishing the film, I was absolutely disappointed that the sequel was never made (I want to cry). The casting was WONDERFUL. Yury Yakovlev as Prince Myshkin was so majestic.

I remember him playing as Ivan The Terrible in "Ivan Vasilievich Changes Profession" by Leonid Gaidai but it was kind of refreshing for me to see him do a role like this!

And I was feeling so bad for Nastasya Filippovna, only if I got to know what happened next.. it was way too much to handle. Like, damn.

Everything about the movie was spectacular! But I'm so, so sad that there wasn't even a second part. I don't know what made them not work on the sequel, but now these characters have been engrained into me.

This makes me want to read its book instead very soon to know what happens after the scene!

[oceanmint]

Sergei Mikhailovich Eisenstein (22 January 1898 – 11 February 1948)

Soviet film director, screenwriter, film editor and film theorist — a pioneer in the theory and practice of montage. He is noted in particular for his silent films Strike (1925), Battleship Potemkin (1925) and October (1928), as well as the historical epics Alexander Nevsky (1938) and Ivan the Terrible (1945/1958).

In its 2012 decennial poll, the magazine Sight & Sound named his Battleship Potemkin the 11th-greatest film of all time.

[mogwai-movie-house]

The 10 Best Russian Films Of All Time

I'm amazed to discover that every one of my favourite Soviet-era Russian films is available to watch for free in HD on the Mosfilm YouTube channel, so I can make a list here from which you can actually watch all the films themselves. Oh the wonders of technology.

Expect some of the most stunning cinematography of all time, and a hefty dollop of propaganda, here and there.

01 - The Cranes Are Flying (1957) ★★★★★★★★½☆

02 - Ballad of a Soldier (1959) ★★★★★★★★½☆

03 - I Am Cuba (1964) ★★★★★★★★½☆

04 - Andrei Rublev (1966) ★★★★★★★★½☆

05 - The Destiny of a Man (1959) ★★★★★★★★☆☆

06 - Stalker (1979) ★★★★★★★☆☆☆

07 - The Ascent (1977) ★★★★★★★☆☆☆

08 - Letter Never Sent (1960) ★★★★★★★☆☆☆

09 - Solaris (1972) ★★★★★★★☆☆☆

10 - Ivan The Terrible (1944/1958) ★★★★★★½☆☆☆

Ivan Part 2 here

[marauderivy]

One thing I like about RusAme is that Alfred gets to be his true self in front of Ivan, or at least that’s what I think. He does not need to hide himself at all because he knows whatever thoughts he have, bright or dark, joyful or angsty, Ivan would understand them perfectly.

In Iron Mirgorod, Sergei Esenin described USA as: “The deeper you go into the heart, toward California, the impression of unwieldiness disappears: Before your eyes pass plains with sparse forest and - alas, terribly reminiscent of Russia!” And likewise, Van Cliburn, the American pianist who won the Tchaikovsky Competition in 1958, also expressed that seen from the airplane, the Moscow plains look so very much like Texas.

They both have this “mainland mentality” which I find truly fascinating - the vast expanses, everything is possible, everything is up for change. And they sure both have that proud and unyielding character that’s directly inherited from the nature that surrounds them.

[ravenkings]

Mikhail Kuznetsov as Fyodor Basmanov in Sergei Eisenstein's Ivan the Terrible, Part II (1958)

[thesludgeofbabylon]

Top 100 Films

Just wanted to put this somewhere for the sake of documentation, might do this once a year to see how much the overall list changes.

Not ranked, but the list is done by release date, earliest to most recent. Includes short and feature length films (plus one TV series, and two serials, if you want to be specific):

• The Musketeers of Pig Alley (1912), dir. D.W. Griffith

• Fantômas (1913), dir. Louis Feuillade

• Les Vampires (1915), dir. Louis Feuillade

• The Doll (1919), dir. Ernst Lubitsch

• Foolish Wives (1922), dir. Erich von Stroheim

• Sherlock, Jr. (1924), dir. Buster Keaton

• Die Nibelungen: Kriemhild’s Revenge (1924), dir. Fritz Lang

• Greed (1924), dir. Erich von Stroheim

• The Last Laugh (1924), dir. F. W. Murnau

• The Gold Rush (1925), dir. Charlie Chaplin

• The General (1926), dir. Buster Keaton, Clyde Bruckman

• Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (1927), dir. F. W. Murnau

• The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928), dir. Carl Theodor Dreyer

• The Docks of New York (1928), dir. Josef von Sternberg

• The Wedding March (1928), dir. Erich von Stroheim

• Man with a Movie Camera (1929), Dziga Vertov

• M (1931), dir. Fritz Lang

• Vampyr (1932), dir. Carl Theodor Dreyer

• I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang (1932), dir. Mervyn LeRoy

• Gold Diggers of 1933 (1933), dir. Mervyn LeRoy, Bubsy Berkeley

• L’Atalante (1934), dir. Jean Vigo

• The Scarlet Empress (1934), dir. Josef von Sternberg

• The Thin Man (1934), dir. W.S. Van Dyke

• The Only Son (1936), dir. Yasujirō Ozu 

• Citizen Kane (1941), dir. Orson Welles

• Now, Voyager (1942), dir. Irving Rapper

• Meshes of the Afternoon (1943), dir. Maya Deren

• Day of Wrath (1943), dir. Carl Theodor Dreyer

• At Land (1944), dir. Maya Deren

• Ivan the Terrible, Part I (1944), dir. Sergei Eisenstein

• Notorious (1946), dir. Alfred Hitchcock

• Sunset Boulevard (1950), dir. Billy Wilder

• Monsieur Hulot’s Holiday (1953), dir. Jacques Tati

• The Wages of Fear (1953), dir. Henri-Georges Clouzot

• The Big Heat (1953), dir. Fritz Lang

• The Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome (1954), dir. Kenneth Anger

• Rear Window (1954), dir. Alfred Hitchcock

• Ordet (1955), dir. Carl Theodor Dreyer

• A Man Escaped (1956), dir. Robert Bresson

• Ivan the Terrible, Part II: The Boyars’ Plot (1958), dir. Sergei Eisenstein

• La Dolce Vita (1960), dir. Federico Fellini

• L’Avventura (1960), dir. Michelangelo Antonioni

• La Notte (1961), dir. Michelangelo Antonioni

• L’Eclisse (1962), dir. Michelangelo Antonioni

• The Exterminating Angel (1962), dir. Luis Buñuel

• Mothlight (1963), dir. Stan Brakhage

• Red Desert (1964), dir. Michelangelo Antonioni

• Gertrud (1964), dir. Carl Theodor Dreyer

• The War Game (1966), dir. Peter Watkins

• Au Hasard Balthazar (1966), dir. Robert Bresson

• Daisies (1966), dir. Věra Chytilová

• Lemon (1969), dir. Hollis Frampton

• The Conformist (1970), dir. Bernardo Bertolucci 

• The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (1972), dir. Luis Buñuel

• F for Fake (1973), dir. Orson Welles

• Lancelot of the Lake (1974), dir. Robert Bresson

• A Woman Under the Influence (1974), dir. John Cassavetes

• The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974). dir. Tobe Hooper

• House (1977), dir. Nobuhiko Obayashi 

• Stalker (1979), dir. Andrei Tarkovsky

• Nostalgia (1983), dir. Andrei Tarkovsky

• L’Argent (1983), dir. Robert Bresson 

• Blue Velvet (1986), dir. David Lynch

• Heathers (1989), dir. Michael Lehmann

• Kiki’s Delivery Service (1989), dir. Hayao Miyazaki

• Baraka (1992), dir. Ron Fricke

• Satantango (1994), dir. Béla Tarr

• A Confucian Confusion (1994), dir. Edward Yang

• Chungking Express (1994), dir. Wong Kar-Wai

• Ed Wood (1994), dir. Tim Burton

• Whisper of the Heart (1995), dir. Yoshifumi Kondo

• Showgirls (1995), dir. Paul Verhoeven 

• Neon Genesis Evangelion: The End of Evangelion (1997), dir. Hideaki Anno, Kazuya Tsurumaki

• Gummo (1997), dir. Harmony Korine

• The Big Lebowski (1998), dir. Joel Coen, Ethan Coen 

• Outer Space (1999), dir. Peter Tscherkassky

• Beau Travail (1999), dir. Claire Denis

• Julien Donkey-Boy (1999), dir. Harmony Korine

• Yi Yi (2000), dir. Edward Yang

• Dancer in the Dark (2000), dir. Lars von Trier

• The Piano Teacher (2001), dir. Michael Haneke

• Mulholland Drive (2001), dir. David Lynch

• What Time Is It There? (2001), dir. Tsai Ming-liang

• Memories of Murder (2003), dir. Bong Joon-ho

• The Matrix Reloaded (2003), dir. Lily Wachowski, Lana Wachowski  

• The Village (2004), dir. M. Night Shyamalan

• Caché (2005), dir. Michael Haneke

• Southland Tales (2006), dir. Richard Kelly

• Inland Empire (2006), dir. David Lynch

• Zodiac (2007), dir. David Fincher

• The White Ribbon (2009), dir. Michael Haneke

• The Turin Horse (2011), dir. Béla Tarr

• Five Broken Cameras (2012), dir. Emad Burnat, Guy Davidi

• The Master (2012), dir. Paul Thomas Anderson

• Spring Breakers (2012), dir. Harmony Korine

• Song to Song (2017), dir. Terrence Malick

• Twin Peaks: The Return (2017), dir. David Lynch

• The Favourite (2018), dir. Yorgos Lanthimos

• Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019), dir. Céline Sciamma

• We’re All Going to the World’s Fair (2021), dir. Jane Schoenbrun

(10/4/23)

[brookstonalmanac]

Birthdays 8.25

Beer Birthdays

George F. Klotter Jr. (1835)

August Uihlein (1842)

Hans Adolf Krebs; biochemist (1900)

Five Favorite Birthdays

Leonard Bernstein; composer, orchestra conductor (1918)

Tim Burton; film director (1958)

Sean Connery; Scottish actor (1930)

Elvis Costello; rock musician, songwriter (1954)

Walt Kelly; cartoonist (1913)

Famous Birthdays

Martin Amis; British writer (1949)

John Badham; film director (1939)

Rachel Bilson; actor (1981)

Billy Ray Cyrus; country singer (1961)

Don DeFore; actor (1913)

Mel Ferrer; actor (1917)

Rollie Fingers; Oakland A's P (1946)

Frederick Forsyth; English writer (1938)

Althea Gibson; tennis player (1927)

Richard Greene; actor (1918)

Rob Halford; English rock singer (1951)

Monty Hall; television host (1923)

Bret Harte; writer (1836)

Ivan the Terrible; Russian leader (1530)

Van Johnson; actor (1916)

Ruby Keeler; dancer, actor (1910)

Emil Kocher; surgeon (1841)

Hans Adolf Krebs; biochemist (1900)

Blake Lively; actor (1987)

Bill Nye; humorist (1850)

Regis Philbin; television host (1934)

Allan Pinkerton; detective (1819)

Michael Rennie; actor (1909)

Charles Richet; physiologist (1850)

Frederick Chapman Robbins; microbiologist (1916)

David Russell; Scottish rock guitarist (1942)

John Savage; actor (1949)

Claudia Schiffer; German model (1970)

Wayne Shorter; jazz saxophonist, composer (1933)

Gene Simmons; rock bassist, singer (1949)

Tom Skerritt; actor (1933)

Whitney Stevens; porn actor (1987)

George Stubbs; English artist (1724)

Blair Underwood; actor (1964)

Johann Gottfried von Herder; German philosopher (1744)

George Wallace; racist politician (1919)

Joanne Whalley; actor (1964)

[em0hamlet]

If your party isn't lit enough to turn our black and white movie world into a technicolor sequence I'm not going man

[voluptuarian]

An expansion for my 365(ish) Days watch list featuring 100+ more movies from 100+ years of film, offering increasingly obscure titles and focus on world cinema.

The link above goes to the Letterboxd list, while the text list can be found below the cut. Happy viewing!

The Adventures of Prince Achmed (1926)

Un Chiene Andalou (1929)

Bambi (1942)

Ivan the Terrible pt. I and II (1944, 1958)

Alice in Wonderland (1951)

The White Reindeer (1952)

House of Wax (1953)

Carmen Jones (1954)

Night of the Hunter (1955)

Sayonara (1957)

Elevator to the Gallows (1958)

The Innocents (1961)

Carnival of Souls (1962)

The Leopard (1963)

The Great Escape (1963)

The Ipcress File (1965)

Persona (1966)

Le Samouraï (1967)

Witchfinder General (1968)

The Lion in Winter (1968)

La Piscine (1969)

The Color of Pomegranates (1969)

Satyricon (1969)

Midnight Cowboy (1969)

Donkey Skin (1970)

Don't Deliver Us From Evil (1971)

Brother Sun, Sister Moon (1972)

Aguirre, the Wrath of God (1972)

Immoral Tales (1973)

Penda's Fen (1974)

Murder on the Orient Express (1974)

Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975)

Salo (1975)

Hedgehog in the Fog (1975)

The Mirror (1975)

Marie Poupee (1976)

In the Realm of the Senses (1976)

The Black Stallion (1979)

The Blue Lagoon (1980)

Heavy Metal (1981)

An American Werewolf in London (1981)

Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)

Son of the White Mare (1981)

The Nine-Colored Deer (1981)

Evil Dead trilogy (1981- )

The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Miss Osbourne (1981)

Possession (1981)

The Return of Martin Guerre (1982)

The Living Dead Girl/La Morte Vivante (1982)

Top Gun (1986)

Little Shop of Horrors (1986)

Jean de Florette/Manon of the Spring (1986- )

Maurice (1987)

Hellraiser (1987)

Dirty Dancing (1987)

Jan Švankmajer's Alice (1988)

Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988)

Heathers (1988)

Tetsuo: The Iron Man and Tetsuo II: The Body Hammer (1989, 1992)

The Juniper Tree (1990)

Daughters of the Dust (1991)

My Own Private Idaho (1991)

The Lover (1992)

Like Water for Chocolate (1992)

The Scent of Green Papaya (1993)

Sankofa (1993)

The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993)

La Reine Margot (1994)

The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (1994)

The Usual Suspects (1995)

Empire Records (1995)

To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar (1995)

Hackers (1995)

The Watermelon Woman (1996)

Event Horizon (1997)

Starship Troopers (1997)

Kirikou and the Sorceress (1998)

The Virgin Suicides (1999)

Chocolat (2000)

Pitch Black (2000)

American Psycho (2000)

Memento (2000)

Ghost World (2001)

Irreversible (2002)

Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner (2001)

Russian Ark (2002)

Hero (2002)

A Tale of Two Sisters (2003)

Kung Fu Hustle (2004)

Blood Tea and Red String (2006)

Curse of the Golden Flower (2006)

Mongol (2007)

Repo! The Genetic Opera (2008)

Thirst (2009)

Never Let Me Go (2010)

Kick-Ass (2010)

American Mary (2012)

Skyfall (2012)

The Lobster (2015)

Kubo and the Two Strings (2016)

Loving Vincent (2017)

Annihilation (2018)

Mandy (2018)

Mad God (2021)

Hatching (2022)

[byneddiedingo]

Nikolay Cherkasov in Ivan the Terrible, Part I

Nikolay Cherkasov in the color sequence of Ivan the Terrible, Part II

Ivan the Terrible, Parts I and II (Sergei Eisenstein, 1945-46) Cast: Nikolay Cherkasov, Lyudmila Tselikovskaya, Serafima Birman, Mikhail Nazvanov, Mikhail Zharov, Amvrosi Buchma, Mikhail Kuznetsov, Pavel Kadochnikov, Andrei Abrikasov, Vsevolod Pudovkin, Vladimir Balashov, Aleksandr Mgebrov, Pavel Massalsky. Screenplay: Sergei Eisenstein. Cinematography: Andrei Moskvin, Eduard Tisse. Production design: Iosif Shpinel, Sergei Eisenstein. Costume design: Leonid Naumov, M. Safonova. Music: Sergei Prokofiev. David Thomson has made a suggestion that a better film epic could be made of the life of Sergei Eisenstein than the one that was made about the life of John Reed -- i.e., Warren Beatty's Reds (1981). In fact, Eisenstein's life was so crowded with artistic and political drama that it would probably have to be an HBO miniseries like Game of Thrones (which is not a bad subtitle for Ivan the Terrible, come to think of it). The drama surrounding Ivan the Terrible alone would be enough for a whole season's episode, with Eisenstein struggling to bring his proposed three-installment film about Stalin's favorite czar to the screen while at the same time dealing with the lethal whims of the dictator himself. After Part I of Ivan the Terrible was released to great acclaim in 1945, including a Stalin Prize from the hands of the man himself, Stalin soured on the project: The mad frenzy of Ivan in Part II cut too close to the bone and it was not released until 1958 -- five years after Stalin's death and ten years after Eisenstein's. Part III had begun filming but was canceled, and what existed of it, except for some stills and scraps, was destroyed. After all this Sturm und Drang, it would be nice to conclude, as some critics have done, that Ivan the Terrible is one of the masterpieces of world cinema. But I can't go that far. It seems to me a great directorial folly, akin to Heaven's Gate (Michael Cimino, 1980) in its directorial excesses, its indulgence in style for style's sake. That the style is immensely entertaining in its artistic wrong-headedness pushes Ivan the Terrible in the direction of camp, a world's fair exhibition of stained-glass attitudes, early silent film poses, great garish sets, costumes that make even the hairiest 16th-century Russians look like drag queens, and in Part II there's a sequence in the most lurid color this side of some of the ballet sequences in MGM musicals of the 1950s. The first time we see Sigismond (Pavel Massalsky), the king of Poland, in Part II, he's sprawled across the throne in a position that almost screams for a sign proclaiming "Careless Decadence,"  and really looks extremely uncomfortable. Ivan's enemy, Archbishop Philip (Andrei Abrikasov), swans about in a billowing cloak that has no known sartorial or clerical necessity, and which allows Ivan (Nikolay Cherkasov) to forestall his exit by simply placing a foot on it. When Philip does manage to leave, the cloak raises a cloud of dust that suggests Ivan needs to liquidate the housekeeping staff. The collection of poses in Ivan the Terrible is balletic and operatic in the worst senses of the words, but the film is also watchable for all those reasons. There are some redeeming values, of course. It's a window into the mind of the Stalinist Soviet Union, both in what it approved and what it banned. It has a distinguished score by Prokofiev, though unfortunately muddied by poor sound reproduction -- in restoring the film, it's too bad that as much attention wasn't paid to providing a new music soundtrack as to cleaning up the images. Visually, it's fascinating, even when the visuals are absurd.

[nanas-45]

Ivan IV: The Terrible Tsar

Ivan the Terrible (Russian: Иван Грозный) is a Soviet cinematic masterpiece directed by Sergei Eisenstein, with a stirring score by Sergei Prokofiev. This two-part epic, featuring Nikolay Cherkasov in the titular role, is Eisenstein's final film and offers a dramatic portrayal of Ivan IV of Russia. The film traces Ivan’s journey from a young ruler to his later years, focusing on his establishment of the oprichnina and his fierce conflicts with the boyars, including his aunt and cousin.

The Making of a Masterpiece Commissioned by Joseph Stalin in early 1941, the film’s production took off in April 1943, with filming occurring in Alma-Ata. Part I premiered in 1945 and won a Stalin Prize, while Part II, completed in 1946, faced censorship and was only released in 1958. Eisenstein had envisioned a third part to complete the story, but production was halted with his death in 1948, leaving the film unfinished and sparking a legacy of mixed reviews.

Plot Overview

Part I: The Rise of Ivan IV The film opens with the assassination of Ivan’s mother, Elena Glinskaya, by the boyars. Ivan, ascending to the throne as the grand prince of Moscow, faces immediate opposition from the boyars and jealousy from his aunt Yefrosinya Staritskaya. His marriage to Anastasia Romanovna is marred by complications, including Kurbsky’s unrequited love for the tsarina and his eventual defection.

Ivan’s military campaigns, including the siege of Kazan, are portrayed with Eisenstein’s signature visual grandeur. However, personal betrayals and political intrigue lead to Ivan's temporary abdication and return to power under the guise of popular demand, setting the stage for the formation of his feared oprichniki.

Part II: The Boyars' Plot The second part delves into the deepening conflicts and conspiracies against Ivan. As Kurbsky aligns with King Sigismund of Poland, Ivan’s rule becomes increasingly autocratic. The plot twists with the poisoning of Ivan's wife, Anastasia, and a series of dramatic confrontations with the boyars and their scheming.

The film’s climax reveals the depth of Ivan’s paranoia and his ruthless consolidation of power, culminating in a dramatic banquet where Ivan cleverly exposes and eliminates his enemies. The narrative paints a vivid portrait of Ivan’s transformation into the feared and formidable ruler known as "Ivan the Terrible."

Legacy and Impact While Eisenstein’s film is celebrated for its grandiose cinematography and dramatic storytelling, it remains controversial due to its political context and the complex legacy of its subject. The film’s exploration of power, betrayal, and political machinations continues to captivate and provoke discussion among viewers and scholars alike.

[pacingmusings]

Seen (again) in 2024:

Ivan the Terrible, Part 2 (Sergei Eisenstein), 1958