Plan for cinema (1936)

8 PLAN FOR CINEMA due homage done and no contact made with commoner clay, a pen whose nib is bent in adoration of its special and honourable servitude to two words. He is not necessarily a communist, this worshipper of Muscovy from afar; on the contrary. He is an objectivist of the most hard and fast kind, solely concerned with form, not in the best sense, but in a quasi-aesthetical mumbo-jumbo which he will eventually call technique. That the Russian films of the most important silent period in cinema's history (the years immediately prior to the advent of sound) are as fine as they are, he quite fails to see is due to the impetus inherently existent in revolution as a subject, particularly a live and real revolution which has just occurred. Without the immense strengthening the Russian experiment gave to Russian social appetite, those films which still are regarded as the few masterpieces of cinema, and possessed of most right to be called works of art, will be found to be of little intrinsic value. Differentiate their subject and their technique and you will find in their technique a scaffolding merely, with no house evolving inside, but a kind of scaffolding nevertheless peculiarly suited to the construction of a house being made under great difficulties and with a somewhat indolent crew. For social conscientiousness is undoubtedly the prime factor in Russian cinema of the 'high' period. As a document, the films are invaluable in showing the spirit of Russia during the time they were made. Their technique is one of shock tactics. And shock tactics are part and parcel of revolution. Thus, in this work, there