And so, the transition between silent films and sound films has begun. To be honest, it was a bit weird to watch a movie with sound today. I still felt like an inter-title card was going to pop up any second. Nonetheless, I enjoyed the movie today. I can see why it was considered a blockbuster in Russia during the time of its release. It had a great plot that depicted the Russian Civil War between the red army, lead by General Vasily Ivanovich Chapaev, and the white army, lead by Colonel Borozdin. The reason behind the film's success is the fact that it was a great example of Socialist Realism, which was Russia's form of government during Stalin's reign.
In terms of technique, I felt the Vasilev brothers did a good job with the sound effects used in the film. There were many fight scenes that required clear sounds of gunshots and cannons going off for the audience to feel like they were on location. The audio of the actors was also quite clear for a movie that was made in the 30s. Despite the fact I don't know a lick of Russian, I noticed that the character's sentences were not getting jumbled together and I could here the pronunciation of each word that was said.
There were a few scenes that could have been in silent format. For example, most of the scenes where Chapeav was conversing with his confidants could have been silent because the reactions of the characters would have been just as effective from an audience standpoint with or without sound. However, there were some scenes that needed sound. One scene that I felt was powerful due to audio was the end of the movie when soldiers were blown away by artillery fire. The loud "boom" from each shell going off drove the point home that the enemy was defeated in a massive way. This scene stuck with me for a few minutes after the ending credits due to hearing that impressive display of fire power.
Overall, I liked the movie. I can't really say anything negative about it plot wise. I think the Vasilev brothers did a good job directing and executed well with each scene. Now, it's on to the next one...
When you talk about the characters speaking above I am curious if you had noticed that in one particular scene the sound almost seemed off? When the two love birds were talking outside explaining the machine gun it almost seemed as if their words were 1 second behind them. Like it was voiced over. I could be wrong and just seeing it unclear but I thought that this may have occurred
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