The Andrei Tarkovsky Collection Review

• 13th Jun 2011

Released on the 13^th June by Artificial Eye is a box set of ALL of Russian filmmaker Andrei Tarkovsky’s features:

Ivan’s Childhood (1962)

Andrei Rublev (1966)

Solaris (1972)

Mirror (1974)

Stalker (1979)

Nostalgia (1983)

The Sacrifice (1986)

Retailing at £59.99 this is an expensive outlay, although given the usual premium price for Artificial Eye releases this does work out a good deal (it also includes a 90 minute documentary, ‘Meeting Andrei Tarkovsky’); therefore anyone who is a fan, this is a must. However, all of Tarkovsky’s films have previously been released on DVD and the box set does come on the back of a 2007 release, The Andrei Tarkovsky Companion, a collection of documentaries profiling the work of the late master of Soviet era cinema. Although Tarkovsky did not have a prolific output, he did produce some of the best known arthouse classics of the late Soviet period – if not the only ones.

His first film, Ivan’s Childhood launched him to immediate success on the international stage winning him the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival. It deals with the trauma of a 12-year-old boy who is seeking revenge after the Nazis have murdered his family during the Second World War. Straight away Tarkovsky’s talent as a filmmaker are evident in this film. He followed this initial success with Andrei Rublev in 1966, a 15^th century period epic that charts the life of an icon painter during a turbulent period in Russia’s history. Given its subject matter the film was not released for a further six years in the Soviet Union, although it did premiere at the Cannes Film Festival in 1969; once again Tarkovsky received plaudits for his work. Perhaps his best known film though is Solaris (re-made in 2002 with George Clooney) – a sci-fi epic  that is slow and moody in pace and was seen by many as Russia’s answer to 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) and is the first of his truly haunting works. Based off a novel by Stanislaw Lem, the story is set on aboard a space station in which a mysterious force coming from a nearby planet releases the inner desires and an illusory experience to those exposed.

For me though, my favourite Tarkovsky film was his next one, Mirror. It puzzled many on its release as it builds in haunting, sensory and autobiographical images in a very complex narration with some quite surreal results. This film marked the artistic height of Tarkovsky both as an artist and a filmmaker. The style of Solaris and Mirror are fused together in his next film, the equally haunting and surreal Stalker as it follows an individual’s quest to realise his dreams and desires.

While making Nostalgia in Italy in the early eighties Tarkovsky, who had a problematic struggle with the Soviet authorities defected to the West with the film portraying the director’s own isolation and melancholy while living in exile. His final film, made while he was gravely ill was The Sacrifice and in his atypical complex manner he expresses his faith in God in a tale about a man who is ready to sacrifice all that is precious to him if he can prevent a nuclear disaster. Certainly since Solaris, Tarkovsky’s work has explored the isolated struggles that man has with himself – and does so in a very surreal reflexive and haunting manner. Born in 1932, he dies shortly after completing The Sacrifice.

Tarkovsky’s films are justifiably considered metaphysical. They are complex moody and in a very Russian way are very beautiful. There are many recurring themes in his films: water, childhood, memory, reflections and dreams. They are not easy films to watch unless you are prepared to go along with the pace. In this sense they are very personal odysseys and one should view them with this in mind.

Chris Hick