Part 2 followed on from Part 1 without a gap the 2 put together would make one colossal movie. The only trouble being that the last 90 minutes or so would still be missing (Part 3). This has a 16 minute colour sequence near the end plus the last 2 minutes that added a new dimension to the story, and although the spotlighting was a bit ropey it all worked well with the usual fantastic camera angles and ugly brooding people.
Ivan vacillates between doing it his way and relying on Mother Church for help. Either way the plotting aristocratic boyars have to be sorted out for once and for all, this he sets out to accomplish with the help of the Men Apart his NKVD. In reality Ivan was going mad at this period, the similarities to Stalin still resound. Eisenstein pulled his punches but must have known Part 2 would end up in trouble, which it did it wasn't released from the metaphorical gulag until 1958, and Part 3 was aborted. Intensely absorbing and startlingly melodramatic by turns it still hasn't got the same energy as Part 1, but that only makes it a lesser classic. Again, it resembles a sedate silent film with sound (with a bit of red this time), the simple tale powerfully told by a master propagandist using sledgehammer symbolism at every turn. Intelligent film-making is hardly the phrase to use a previous post compared Eisenstein correctly to Kurosawa very different styles but with the same results.
Wonderful sequel, much better to be watched on the heels of Part 1. At least the people who didn't like that won't watch this and comment adversely on it, right?
Ivan vacillates between doing it his way and relying on Mother Church for help. Either way the plotting aristocratic boyars have to be sorted out for once and for all, this he sets out to accomplish with the help of the Men Apart his NKVD. In reality Ivan was going mad at this period, the similarities to Stalin still resound. Eisenstein pulled his punches but must have known Part 2 would end up in trouble, which it did it wasn't released from the metaphorical gulag until 1958, and Part 3 was aborted. Intensely absorbing and startlingly melodramatic by turns it still hasn't got the same energy as Part 1, but that only makes it a lesser classic. Again, it resembles a sedate silent film with sound (with a bit of red this time), the simple tale powerfully told by a master propagandist using sledgehammer symbolism at every turn. Intelligent film-making is hardly the phrase to use a previous post compared Eisenstein correctly to Kurosawa very different styles but with the same results.
Wonderful sequel, much better to be watched on the heels of Part 1. At least the people who didn't like that won't watch this and comment adversely on it, right?