Describing the violent repression of the Czarist troops, the Odessa steps sequence from Battleship Potemkin (Sergei Eisenstein, 1925) is perhaps the most famous sequence in the history of film editing. In it, the bystanders who have come to cheer on the sailors aboard the ship are brutally massacred by Cossacks.
Discussion Questions
After watching this clip from Battleship Potemkin, consider the questions below. Then submit your response.
1. Why is the pacing of the editing and the movement within shots critical to the meaning of the sequence? How are our perceptions of space and time shaped and altered by editing in the sequence? Pay attention to variations in angle and shot length.
2. How is this clip the quintessential example of what Eisenstein calls “dialectical montage”?