#87 - Alexander Nevsky

#87 is our 2nd Russian film - (after Andrei Rublev) - and it comes in a fascinating time - the height of Stalinist Russia, before the second World War - it's a pretty good film, IMHO - but definitely shows the times it was made in, with a little bit of propaganda/state line thrown in

There's a lot about the director, Sergei Eisenstein, in Wikipedia - these are his last films, and I guess this was his most popular - the historical figure Alexander Nevsky is shown in his great battle stopping the Germans, who conveniently seem to have icons and helmets very, very similar to Nazi Germany - LOL   - the pivotal point of the film is what must be a 30 minute battle scene that inspired many later battle scenes including the Battle of Aracourt from Henry V, the great final battle in Seven Samurai, and others we've seen up to here

The story itself only has a bit of plot - the Germans are coming, the Russian folk hero and peasants rally, and defeat them with the last lines being immortalized as print in the closing "He who comes to Russia with a sword will die by the sword" - wonder who that was meant to inspire or discourage - LOL

The funny part of all this is although the film was made in '38, and tensions between Germany and Russia were strained, the treaty of  '39 that divided Poland basically took the film out of circulation for two years until '41 when the Germans declared War on Russia, making this film very, very relevant again.

some pretty good orchestral music in here too, and there are some snippets from an earlier failed film he did, an audio commentary that seems pretty good, and other stuff that makes this one of the more feature heavy DVD's of the early period.

Interestingly, the website for Criterion puts this as out of print although the Wikipedia page does not but it may be in the Janus Film box set (most of which I have been unimpressed with due to their lower quality/transfers) - SO - if you want to see it, you might have to wait for the Criterion Channel or raid the library cause I think even my Netflix was not sure if it was gonna be around

of course, most of these are also on Amazon Prime for rental at $1.99 or so if you wish - in any case, it's a good film with a crude if effective and inspirational battle scene - :)