Eisenstein: The Sound Years

Eisenstein: The Sound Years

Sergei Eisenstein, long regarded as a pioneer of film art, changed cinematic strategies halfway through his career. Upon returning from Hollywood and Mexico in the late 1930s, he left behind the densely edited style of celebrated silents like Battleship Potemkin and October, turning instead to historical sources, contradictory audiovisuals, and theatrical sets for his grandiose yet subversive sound-era work. This trio of rousing action epics reveals a deeply unsettling portrait of the Soviet Union under Stalin, and provided battle-scene blueprints for filmmaking giants from Laurence Olivier in Henry V to Akira Kurosawa in Seven Samurai.

Film Info

  • Spine #86

Films In This Set

Special Features

  • Gorgeous new digital transfers, all with restored image and sound
  • Audio essay on Alexander Nevsky by film scholar David Bordwell
  • Multimedia essays on Eisenstein’s collaboration with composer Sergei Prokofiev, the history of Ivan the Terrible, and Eisenstein’s visual vocabulary
  • A reconstruction of Eisenstein’s unfinished film Bezhin Meadow, plus rare photos and documents from the set
  • Deleted scenes from Ivan the Terrible
  • Drawings and production stills
  • Restoration demonstration
  • New English subtitle translations

New covers by Gordon Reynolds

Purchase Options

Films In This Set

Eisenstein: The Sound Years

Special Features

  • Gorgeous new digital transfers, all with restored image and sound
  • Audio essay on Alexander Nevsky by film scholar David Bordwell
  • Multimedia essays on Eisenstein’s collaboration with composer Sergei Prokofiev, the history of Ivan the Terrible, and Eisenstein’s visual vocabulary
  • A reconstruction of Eisenstein’s unfinished film Bezhin Meadow, plus rare photos and documents from the set
  • Deleted scenes from Ivan the Terrible
  • Drawings and production stills
  • Restoration demonstration
  • New English subtitle translations

New covers by Gordon Reynolds