Commissioned for the tenth anniversary of the 1917 Revolution, the celebratory October: Ten Days That Shook the World is a thrilling reconstruction of the events from February 1917 to the revolution, and of the Bolsheviks’ overthrow of the Czarists and Kerensky’s provisional government in October 1917.
Although Eisenstein’s visually dynamic expression of abstract ideas was attacked for excessive ‘formalism’, October has lost none of its power to attract and energise, with its rapidly alternating machine-gunned images and audacious cross-cutting. With its Leningrad location and the Winter Palace appearing the same as in 1917, and many participants of the actual revolution appearing in the film, October has become the official record of the Revolution.
The film is presented as a 2-disc 'hyperkino edition'. Disc 1 contains the standard film in the best available print, with optional subtitles. Disc 2 contains the film, plus numerous scene-specific annotations, video clips and documents (in Russian and in English). These can be viewed on screen, contextualising the film and enhancing the viewer’s understanding. This innovative format works extremely well and is one of the most exciting developments in DVD for years. It is especially valuable for important works of world cinema whose historical contexts crave further exploration.
