Close Up (Mar-Dec 1932)

CLOSE UP adequately, with the result that both, his Westfront and Kameradschaft, were criticised with the same fervour and received almost equally flattering notices. On closer examination, however, we find that we can safely eliminate the former from the list of film classics and that, of the two films, only Kameradschaft deserves serious attention. I will go even further and say that the war-film did not show us Georgi Pabst in his happiest mood and it certainly compares unfavourably with his next work Die Dreigroschenoper . Kameradschaft, on the other hand, is as near to filmic perfection as one can expect to-day. I do not wish to convey the impression that Westfront 191 8 is a worthless effort, deserving of no consideration whatsoever. On the contrary, for the film still stands head and shoulders above its American contemporaries. But in its treatment and more especially in its subject matter the film closely resembles another picture dealing with a similar subject, namely Dovjenko's Arsenal, the tragic story of a workers' rising in a munition factory at Kiev. At the making of this film for the Ukranian State Cinema Vufku, O. Dovjenko was by no means the world-famous director his later production Earth made him, though at that time many advanced critics already considered his work of the same high standard set by the creators of Mother and Potemkin. Let us, for a moment, compare the two pictures, and it will be observed that both directors, with profound understanding, dealt with one of the most sordid aspects of war, namely the woman who remained behind. Much has been written about these tragic affairs of soldiers whose place at home has been taken by somebody else and there is no subject which can more easily become a trivial drama of love. This delicate subject, however, was treated by both directors with equal skill and sincerity, though on a quite different basis, and the Dovjenko portrayal was more powerful in its simplicity. I still have a vivid recollection, after so many years, of the solitary figure of a woman standing in a darkened room. The camera work of this scene was almost technically perfect, with the light playing only on the window, revealing part of the woman's face. In her arms she held a baby. Then a soldier — or the ghost of a soldier — passed across the window and the wall and from similar corners rose similar mothers, facing similar ghosts who questioned them. . . . This incident was composed with a touch of real artistry, powerful in its appeal, yet constructed with the utmost simplicity, revealing in its stark realism and delicate photography the hand of a master. Thus Dovjenko summed up the drama of the situation, once and for all, in his nimble play of light and shade. In further comparing the two films we also observe that the opening sequences of Arsenal are superior to those of the Pabst picture. Here Dovjenko makes amazing use of the expressive short cut ; a cutting of close-ups from different angles. They are unsurpassed in their representation and a masterwork of brutal brilliance. The successive scenes at the opening of the Soviet film are gripping in their sordidness and show clearly the work of a genius in their power and scope, while the sequences, as a whole, are overwhelming. What emotional play that Russian cameraman — Demutski I think it was — made of these opening scenes !