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7.3 1h 35m

Ivan the Terrible, Part I

Set during the early part of his reign, Ivan faces betrayal from the aristocracy and even his closest friends as he seeks to unite the Russian people. Sergei Eisenstein's final film, this is the first part of a three-part biopic of Tsar Ivan IV of Russia, which was never completed due to the producer's dissatisfaction with Eisenstein's attempts to use forbidden experimental filming techniques and excessive cost overruns. The second part was completed but not released for a decade after Eisenstein's death and a change of heart in the USSR government toward his work; the third part was only in its earliest stage of filming when shooting was stopped altogether.

Top Cast

  • Nikolai Cherkasov

    Nikolai Cherkasov

    Czar Ivan IV

  • Lyudmila Tselikovskaya

    Lyudmila Tselikovskaya

    Czarina Anastasia Romanovna

  • Serafima Birman

    Serafima Birman

    Boyarina Efrosinia Staritskaya

  • Mikhail Nazvanov

    Mikhail Nazvanov

    Prince Andrei Kurbsky

  • Mikhail Zharov

    Mikhail Zharov

    Czar's Guard Malyuta Skuratov

  • Amvrosii Buchma

    Amvrosii Buchma

    Czar's Guard Aleksei Basmanov

  • Mikhail Kuznetsov

    Mikhail Kuznetsov

    Fyodor Basmanov

  • Pavel Kadochnikov

    Pavel Kadochnikov

    Vladimir Andreyevich Staritsky

  • Andrei Abrikosov

    Andrei Abrikosov

    Boyar Fyodor Kolychev

Overview

Set during the early part of his reign, Ivan faces betrayal from the aristocracy and even his closest friends as he seeks to unite the Russian people. Sergei Eisenstein's final film, this is the first part of a three-part biopic of Tsar Ivan IV of Russia, which was never completed due to the producer's dissatisfaction with Eisenstein's attempts to use forbidden experimental filming techniques and excessive cost overruns. The second part was completed but not released for a decade after Eisenstein's death and a change of heart in the USSR government toward his work; the third part was only in its earliest stage of filming when shooting was stopped altogether.

Rating

7.3 / 10
228 Reviews
1 Popular

1 Reviews

  • CinemaSerf
    CinemaSerf
    8 Jun 6, 2022

    Nikolay Cherkasov is superb in this speculative biopic of the infamous Tsar of all the Russias. Made towards the end of the Second World War, Sergei Eisenstein manages to create a magnificent depiction of just how this often barbaric, but actually rather shrewd and intelligent 16th century monarch inherited and retained his throne despite plots and intrigues from his court, his people, his nobles - basically, just about everyone. His goal? Well that is presented in an almost Stalinist style. To unite the Russian peoples and to protect them from the oppression of those who would invade their land and take away their freedoms. The anti-Nazi rhetoric is front, centre and potent. This is also a terrific historical epic with great attention to detail, some penetrating photographic techniques and a string supporting actors portraying friend and foe that all offers us a captivating, sometimes quite claustrophobic, illustration of a nation and a government that seems frequently but a hair's breath from insanity. Lyudmila Tselikovskaya is superb as his conspiring Tsarina Anastasia as is Serafima Birman as his even more duplicitous aunt Efrosinia who has designs on his throne for her own son Vladimir - who rather epitomises the theory of the inbred degenerate identified by Josef von Sternberg in "The Scarlett Empress" made ten years earlier. At times it has the theatrical style of a silent film; the lighting and staging and the eyes - indeed the facial expressions in general, combined with the rousing Prokofiev score convey much more than any mere dialogue ever could. A finer tale of power lust, debauchery and metal instability you will never see in film - and I loved it!

Trailers & Clips

Recommendations

Ivan the Terrible, Part II: The Boyars' Plot

This is the second part of a projected three-part epic biopic of Russian Czar Ivan Grozny, undertaken by Soviet film-maker Sergei Eisenstein at the behest of Josef Stalin. Production of the epic was stopped before the third part could be filmed, due to producer dissatisfaction with Eisenstein's introducing forbidden experimental filming techniques into the material, more evident in this part than the first part. As it was, this second part was banned from showings until after the deaths of both Eisenstein and Stalin, and a change of attitude by the subsequent heads of the Soviet government. In this part, as Ivan the Terrible attempts to consolidate his power by establishing a personal army, his political rivals, the Russian boyars, plot to assassinate him.

Ivan the Terrible, Part II: The Boyars' Plot

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