Moustroll Good movie but grossly overrated

Dotbankey A lot of fun.

Plustown A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.

Logan By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

kurosawakira Tarkovsky's my first real love. This man's films felt as if they were drawn directly from my own soul, image form given to my own dreams. His camera-eye is marvelously free, even here where mostly it moves so geometrically to put Greena-way to shame, or then just observing, silently and without moving. This isn't like "Andrei Rublev" (1966), which deep down I still cherish more than anything, and where the eye moves much like Malick likes to move it nowadays: here there's apparent discipline, kind of theoretical rumination in all the eye does and perceives, but it's of such beauty I dare one to ignore it. One may see this in how he sees small, every day things either up close or far away — light paints and shadows frame the action, which usually consists of us gazing upon a scene far in the distance. Surely the poet mirrors Tarkovsky and what he does. It's Andrei (Gorchakov, the poet in the film) who carries the candle the distance but it's Andrei (Tarkovsky, the director) who carries it for us to see.The famous forced perspective shot in the end is worth its reputation, but for me the interiors are the most breathtaking shots. This is great to see before "Offret" (1986) but especially after "Zerkalo" (1975). The former has, over the years, been unable to elicit the kind of reaction Tarkovsky usually does (it's his most difficult film for me for that reason, by no means reduced in mastery) so this kindles its flame. The latter, however, is as perfect as it gets, and stretches out to this as well, annotating, amplifying, extending.

Jose Cruz No, you can't. Tarkovsky is the ultimate art filmmaker and he demonstrates it again in this great picture, I would say, his best picture that he made outside of Russia. The other one (The Sacrifice) is also great, but I would prefer this over The Sacrifice, which is a picture that sacrifices a bit too much of Tarkovsky trademarks such as being a picture driven by images, instead dialogue takes center stage. Here, by contrast, we have a picture that is driven mostly by images, hence, being a highly original and powerful exercise of film-making.The film also has a deeper plot than The Mirror, though it is still not a plot driven film like Solaris. It shows the influence of The Mirror on Tarkovsky films: before he made The Mirror, his films were still slightly more conventional but after they became much more avant garde and audacious.This film is essential for film buffs and I might say it is perhaps one of the top 100 greatest films ever made.

Polaris_DiB Italy is a very attractive place for filmmakers, because of its art, architecture, the lighting, and also film history. Many filmmakers go to Italy and immerse themselves in the people and the culture, the light and the atmosphere. Tarkovsky goes to Italy and he makes it as dank, dark, and unpopulated as he makes Russia. And, while in Italy, he has a few things to say about Italians--to explain Russia."Then you can't understand Italy, because you're not Italian." A poet goes to Italy to research into the biography of a Russian composer who stayed there for two years, and his life parallels that of the composer. Just so, Tarkovsky's life parallels that of the main character, who is also called Andrei: left in Italy surrounded by so much "beauty it's sickening", he becomes haunted by flashbacks of his family in Russia. Trying unsuccessfully to communicate with his translator (get it?) and striking a metaphysical relationship with a local mystic, Andrei the character struggles with the typical Tarkovskian themes of faith, fire, personal loss, and water, among others.Tarkovsky is up to some well-rehearsed tricks here. Long takes with an impossibly smooth floating camera dedicate the viewer's eyes to the imagery. The weather is under the same amount of control. A character enters a new space (here it's Italy; in Stalker it's the Zone; in Solyaris it's the space station; in Andrei Rublev it's the society outside the church), and only through intense emotional and philosophical struggle can he prepare himself to return to where he's come from. Thresholds stand tantalizingly around, but don't often get passed (Andrei can walk through a door that leads nowhere with no problem, but can only cross a pool with a candle with immense physical struggle). Spaces are separated by black and white and sepia tones. God is always there but never for you.There's some new tricks, too. Tarkovsky plays with light a lot in this one, and frames that seem to sink into pure black suddenly illuminate hidden images and icons. A compelling sonic disturbance is created in flashbacks to Russia that sound like a table-saw grinding away at wood; "The Music" the mystic speaks of is warped and fragmented vinyl.Nostalghia, I feel, is not the Tarkovsky movie you want to see first. First see Stalker, or Solyaris, or Mirror. Nostalghia removes the transition from Russia to Italy and so the feeling of transition and change is a lot more dependent on the symbolic and abstract sensibilities, and previous knowledge of Tarkovsky's imagery will help to interpret it. For fans of Tarkovsky, however, Nostalghia is a sweet and personal return into his dense and foggy mind (or house, as Chris Marker calls it), the world that only he was able to fully explore.--PolarisDiB

film_reviewer-1 Tarkovsky is the greatest director who has ever lived, except for (the British) Hitchcock. The spiritual and religious questions are given to the audience like a one-on-one commentary while experiencing the journey of his quasi-plot.Russian cinema was so brilliant, all the way back to the theorist times of Eisenstein and his colleagues, that now I wonder why, with all that Putinesque oil money, they can't revive their cinema. Cinema was their art form. They were surely not that great at producing the visual arts, better yet at the theorizing. Despite their awful communism, the Russians were so much more advanced in cinema than Americans (who were so dependent on the theatrical story). The stumbling block was the aftermath of WWII. Should that be allowed to essentially destroy all solid cultural expression? Russians should be the leaders. (The Russians trained the Chinese and look how well they did. Why can't Russia do this for their own people?)Americans see Russians as a bunch of murderous thugs. That's what happens when you kill off journalist critics. Take a lesson from America and discredit them like they did to Dan Rather and others. Don't murder the opposition. But, of course, Tarkovsky had to even defect. As far as I know, no one defects now. Is that because there's no one left? Tarkovsky gave Russia and the world something to marvel at. Tarkovsky and the great Russian writers and composers are Russia, not just the economic warriors of late. Nostalghia is not my favorite Tarkovsky film. Still, it may contain the most relevant angst- filled situations common to modern day living. The famous candle scene is unforgettable. For the visually-minded, Tarkovsky films are not slow, just like abstract expressionism is not hard to understand. There's so much to see in his films. Whereas Hitchcock is a filmmaker's filmmaker, Tarkovsky is a painter-poet's filmmaker.