Faust (1926) F.W. Murnau

Faust (original German title: Faust – Eine deutsche Volkssage ) is a 1926 film written and directed by Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau. It was the last film Murnau shot in Germany and the last of his films that can be attributed to Expressionism. On the occasion of the Berlin premiere in 1926, the film was accompanied by orchestral music composed by Werner Richard Heymann. This edition of Faust is instead accompanied by the original soundtrack by Cinestesia

The plot is inspired by the famous History of Dr. Faust, well-known magician and necromancer (1587) by Johann Spies, into which Murnau weaves elements from the plays of Marlowe and Goethe. Far more than literary references, artistic ones take on greater importance. As a scholar and art connoisseur, Murnau draws inspiration from Flemish and Italian painters in composing his frames; it is possible to catch references to famous works in Faust : the feet of the plague victim reminiscent of those in Mantegna's Lamentation of Christ , and the resemblance, in these scenes, between Gretchen and Bernini's famous Ecstasy of Saint Teresa .

However, what gives the film the appearance of a pictorial masterpiece is, above all, the use of chiaroscuro, which Murnau learned from Caravaggio and Rembrandt to transfer it to cinematography.

Eric Rohmer wrote about this: "If Faust is the most pictorial of his films, it is because the conflict between shadow and light constitutes its subject." Light thus becomes the key to reading this work in every aspect, both aesthetic and symbolic.

Battleship Potemkin (1925) Sergei Eisenstein

Battleship Potemkin (original Russian title: Броненосец «Потёмкин»  , Bronenosets Po'tyomkin ) was the second feature film directed by Sergei Eisenstein; today it is considered an absolute masterpiece of world cinema, not only for its aesthetic merits and its value as a historical and social document, but also for the linguistic innovations that continue to stimulate the creativity of filmmakers and critical debate. One hundred years after its theatrical release (January 21, 1926), we re-present this work not with the original soundtrack by Edmund Meisel or the more common one by Nikolai Kryukov, but with a new soundtrack composed, performed, and recorded live by Cinestesia, which reinterprets this immortal cinema classic in an alternative and contemporary way.

Battleship Potemkin is an ensemble film in which no single protagonist emerges; at the center of the story are the people with their multiplicity of viewpoints. To use the director's own words: 

"...it seems like a newsreel (or chronicle) of events, but in reality, it strikes like a drama. The secret of this effect lies in the fact that the rhythm of the newsreel adapts to the rigorous laws of tragic composition; and even more so, of tragic composition in its most classical form: the tragedy in five acts." 

00:27 - Act I. Men and Maggots 

13:54 - Act II. Drama on the Deck 

31:45 - Act III. A Dead Man Calls Out 

43:00 - Act IV. The Odessa Steps 

54:15 - Act V. One Against All 

Produced in 1925, the film was commissioned and produced by Goskino to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the 1905 Russian Revolution. The direction was entrusted to the young Sergei Mikhailovich Eisenstein, then twenty-seven years old, who had already distinguished himself with his debut film Strike!. 

The original project, based on the treatment written by Nina Agadzhanova-Shutko, planned the creation of several films based on multiple historical episodes starting from the Russo-Japanese War (1904-1905). After a scouting trip to the city of Odessa, the director was struck by the monumental staircase (designed by the Italian architect Francesco Boffo), which suggested the famous scene set there. 

He proposed and obtained permission from the production to make a single film telling the story of the mutiny of the Potemkin sailors and the violent repression that befell the inhabitants of Odessa who sided with the rebels. This episode occupied a small and marginal space in Nina Agadzhanova's subject; Eisenstein developed it into a screenplay together with Grigori Vasilievich Aleksandrov . 

In historical reality, the massacre took place at night along the city streets, but in the cinematic reconstruction, the director chooses to set it on the staircase, which, due to its particular shape, allows him to put into practice his theories on montage. For a more in-depth analysis of these, we refer to later videos, limiting ourselves here to highlighting the three scenes most frequently cited by critics to illustrate Eisenstein's theories: 

(13:05) The sailor breaking the plate. This scene, which closes the first act of the film, is an example of overlapping editing : the same action is filmed and shown from different points of view; the editing of the shots extends the duration of the event, emphasizing it and amplifying its impact. The sailor's outburst of anger marks, in fact, the beginning of the revolt. 

(53:38) The broken glasses. The Odessa Steps sequence closes with the elderly woman being struck by a soldier. Here, Eisenstein uses the opposite technique to overlapping editing, subtracting frames from the sequence instead of adding them: we see the soldier striking his blows and immediately after the woman's face covered in blood... we as viewers are forced to mentally reconstruct what happened, making us participants in it. 

(54:08) The lion. This scene, characterized by strong symbolism—the lion is the people who sleep, wake up, and rebel—is an example of how Eisenstein uses montage to give his images a metaphorical meaning as well. 

These famous examples represent only a small part of the devices used by Eisenstein in his film, which push cinematic montage beyond its primary narrative function, making it evolve into expressive montage . 

O Cinestesia, grupo de leitura de filmes, encerra o ciclo B de Bergman com um encontro em torno de GERTRUD, dirigido por Carl Th. Dreyer. O último longa do cineasta dinamarquês, realizado em 1964, evidencia o amplo diálogo entre estes dois artistas da “alma nórdica”. Iniciamos a primeira parte do ciclo bergmaniano com A PALAVRA (Dreyer, 1955) e encerraremos a segunda com GERTRUD, abrindo uma…

Esiste davvero il sesto senso? Sì, ma non è un fenomeno paranormale. Vista, tatto, gusto, olfatto e udito ma non solo. Abbiamo un sesto senso che ci fa avere la percezione del nostro corpo: si chiama propriocezione. Il sesto senso lo abbiamo tutti ma non ha nulla a che fare con il paranormale. Oltre alla vista, al tatto, all'udito, all'olfatto e al gusto, abbiamo un sesto senso che si chiama propriocezione (o cinestesia): si tratta della capacità di sentire il proprio corpo nello spazio per cui, per esempio, riusciamo a toccarci la punta del naso anche al buio perché sappiamo perfettamente dov'è la nostra mano e dove abbiamo il naso sulla faccia. Come un radar Il sistema propriocettivo non ha occhi né orecchie, ma tanti recettori diversi sparsi nel corpo per raccogliere informazioni e farci capire, pure a occhi chiusi, dove siamo e in che posizione ci troviamo: ci sono per esempio i fornite dal sistema vestibolare, nell'orecchio interno, che ci fa capire dove siamo nello spazio: attraverso tre canalicoli semicircolari orientati in tre direzioni e gli otoliti, sassolini liberi di muoversi, possiamo accorgerci se stiamo andando in avanti o indietro, verso l'alto o il basso, se stiamo girando su noi stessi o accelerando, mantenendo perciò sempre il controllo del corpo e l'equilibrio. Silente Del sesto senso però non siamo consapevoli perché il cervello elimina alla coscienza gli stimoli sensoriali continuamente presenti per potersi occupare di altro: se fossimo sempre in allerta nel percepire i vestiti addosso, la pressione del pavimento sotto i piedi o l'angolazione del gomito non potremmo porre l'attenzione su compiti più complicati, come guidare l'auto, scrivere o altro.