Soviet Avant-Garde Cinema

Dziga Vertov - Chelovek S Kinoapparatom AKA Man With A Movie Camera [Alloy Orchestra Score] (1929)

"Man with a Movie Camera stands as a stinging indictment of almost every film made between its release in 1929 and the appearance of Godard’s À Bout de Souffle 30 years later – and Vertov’s dazzling picture seems, today, arguably the fresher of the two. In any case, it’s shameful that it took directors three full decades – three full decades of generally static, tedious “movies” – to remember that movies should really move, that the camera can and should be a mobile, vibrant participant in an exciting process: the transmission of events onto celluloid. This is what Man with a Movie Camera is all about. In terms of the use to which the medium was put, it’s a quantum leap forward, one of the rare films that deserves to be called a work of genius.” (Neil Young)

Selected and presented by Dimitrina Sevova