Our second art-house classic from 1966 in a row. This one was, I confess, more of a struggle to get through than Algiers. We're familiar with Tarkovsky (we've seen Stalker, Solaris, Ivan's Childhood and Mirror) so we knew what to expect, but this one was, if anything, harder to follow than Mirror. Ostensibly a biography of the early 15th century painter-of-religious-frescoes, it is instead a series of chapters, very loosely linked by the titular Rublev being involved, sometimes very tangentially. One gets the impression that there is deeply felt religious conviction bubbling somewhere under the surface, but lacking even one tiny religious bone, it was all surface to me. Of course, because it's Tarkovsky, that surface is exquisite, and, like his only previous movie Ivan's Childhood, in gorgeous black and white (apart from the epilogue, where the real Rublev's actual art is shown in color). My Tarkovsky-viewing philosophy is to treat it like a visit to an art museum and as much as possible just try to get lost in the imagery. This is hampered somewhat by the need to read the subtitles, but I've never found Tarkovsky's dialogue to be particularly striking (maybe it loses something in the translation) so probably the best thing to do would be to watch it a second time without subtitles. I think it'll be a while with Andrei Rublev, though, although in saying that I know I'm committing blasphemy (perhaps almost literally, given the overt religiosity of the film), as this is one of the most highly-praised of his, but it is over three hours long. Fortunately, it is broken into digestible chapters, and I'll summarize them now.
The film opens on three young monks walking through the countryside. They are our hero, Andrei, and Daniil and Kiril. It begins to rain, so they take shelter in what looks like a barn, although it might as well be a pub, as it is packed with people drinking and celebrating, most notably a jester, who sings a song, bangs a drum and does flips.
Kiril steps out, soldiers arrive, arrest the jester and knock him out and take him off on a horse. They come back for his musical instrument and break it. Everyone is a little shellshocked and then Kiril comes back and the three monks leave.
2. Theophanes the Greek (1405-6)
This is broken into two parts. In the first, Kiril has found the eponymous famous fresco-painter and talks to him in his workshop, eventually persuading him to hire him (Kiril) as his assistant for the job of painting the Cathedral of the Annunciation (in Moscow).
Kiril mentions Andrei rather disparagingly and you get the impression that he knows Andrei is better than him which is why he's come to see Theophanes to pip Andrei to the post. The second part is at the monastery, or at least, outside in the yard in the dead of winter, where a man comes from Theophanes, and instead of offering the job to Kiril as planned (Kiril clearly wanted this to happen in front of his fellow monks), he hires Andrei. Andrei accepts (without much fanfare) which briefly annoys Danil, who refuses to come with him when asked (but says goodbye later), and enrages Kiril to the extent that he quits the monastery and storms off and (in one of several very upsetting scenes of animal cruelty in the film) beats his dog savagely when it tries to follow him.
3. The Passion (1406)
Andrei is on the way to Moscow with a new character, apparently an apprentice, Foma, whom he chides for being a liar. They encounter Theophanes in the woods and the old man bad temperedly sends Foma away. A dead swan features, for some reason. Andrei and Theophanes argue about religion (the latter seems far less filled with reverence than the former) and we see a mock crucifixion being performed on a snowy hill (the passion of the title).
Foma clearly hasn't gone far, because he's washing brushes in the stream, leading to an indelible image of white paint in the flowing water.
4. The Holiday (1408)
Now it's Summer, and Andrei and Foma are walking in the woods by a river behind some others when Andrei hears something and looks back to see lights. On investigating (he has to struggle through thick undergrowth) he stumbles on a pagan festival, involving much nudity and cavorting, and enacting what appears to be a mock mini Viking funeral in the river.
Andrei is caught spying and tied to a cross inside a hut. A pagan woman is intrigued by him and sets him free. He runs off and gets caught up in the undergrowth again, only finding his party (not just Foma but another apprentice who is a recurring figure, as well as another man) in the morning. They get into a boat and are floating off
when they see soldiers chasing a pagan couple (one of whom is the woman who freed Andrei). They catch both but the woman breaks free and dropping her clothes, jumps into the river and swims away, passing Andrei's boat without a look.
5. The Last Judgment (1408)
Andrei and Danil are in a town called Vladimir, supposedly painting a picture of the last judgment, but Andrei has painter's block. As his assistants potter about in the church, which is all white, Andrei goes for a walk along a road with Danil and confesses that he doesn't want to paint images to scare the masses. A messenger rides by them, and brings the news that the Bishop insists they must be finished by Autumn. Foma is fed up and packs up and leaves for a job at a less prestigious church.
Elsewhere, stone carvers (presumably associated with Andrei) have finished working in the mansion of the Grand Duke. Children run around, one of them is picked up by a burly man and slaps him repeatedly, to no noticeable effect. However, the Grand Duke doesn't like the work and wants them to re-do it. They refuse and leave intending to go work for the Grand Duke's brother. However, they are waylaid in the forest and, in a scene of sudden savagery (because they don't seem to be expecting anything bad from the people who waylay them, they have their eyes cut out!
We return to Andrei's church to find him throwing dark mud-like paint on the white walls. (According to Wikipedia, this is in protest because he has heard of the blinding, but I didn't pick that up.) A young boy who escaped the blinding comes in and is instructed to read from the bible. A seemingly simple woman comes in from a rainstorm
and seems upset by the paint and smears it obsessively, wailing.
6. The Raid (Autumn 1408)
We meet the aforementioned brother of the Grand Duke, who has allied with a band of Tatars who invade Vladimir. They burn and loot but find few people until they realize they're all barricaded in the church. They set up one of those swinging log things and break down the door and come in and kill just about everybody except Andrei and the mute simple girl (Durochka) who only escapes being raped because Andrei kills the soldier who is carrying her upstairs. We see a man being tortured (Wikipedia says he is the king's messenger) but he refuses to reveal what they want to hear so they poor molten metal in his mouth and drag him off behind a horse. In the aftermath, among the corpses,
Durochka plaits a dead woman's hair while Andrei has a conversation with an apparently-living but known-to-be dead Theophanes. This section also includes a rather horrific scene of a horse falling off a platform and I read that it died - adding to the theme of animal cruelty.
7. Silence (1412)
Andrei has brought Durochka back to the monastery, but he has also taken on a vow of silence because he killed a man. Times are hard - crops have failed and all there are to eat are sour apples. Among some refugees, a much-changed Kiril is recognized, who begs the father superior to be allowed to stay.
Only if you write out the scriptures 15 times, he is told. A dwarf, who perhaps had the job before, delighted runs after the father superior after hearing this.
Tatars show up at the monastery, but Andrei practically ignores them. One of them takes a fancy to Durochka, offering her the chance to be his umpteenth wife (but first Russian). Showing how simple she is, she is delighted (particularly by his pointy hat) and snatches her arm away when Andrei tries to drag her off and rides off with them. Kiril re-introduces himself to Andrei and reassures him that the Tatars will be scared to harm a "holy fool," but he cannot get Andrei to break his silence, and Andrei just goes back to his task of taking hot stones from a fire to drop into a caldron, although he fumbles one into the snow.
8. The Bell (1423-24)
As you can tell, significant time has passed, and Andrei has aged noticeably. His hair has fallen out and he looks haggard. But he's only an incidental figure in this final section, which is about the forging of a bell for a church. This is masterminded by the teenaged son (Boriska) of a famous bell-maker, whom soldiers come looking for to be told he's died of the plague. Boriska persuades them to take him instead, insisting that his father passed on his secrets before he died (of course he didn't). You can view this as a sort of separate mini-movie, as we watch Boriska becoming tyrannical as he bosses his underlings,
many of them far older than him, and has a young assistant beaten for refusing (on good grounds) to do what he tell him to do. However, he succeeds! The bell is cast and it rings, which is a good thing because the Grand Duke is watching, ready to decapitate everyone involved if the bell does not ring. When it does, everyone but Boriska celebrates. He collapses, wracking with sobs, as Andrei cradles him and breaks his silence. Boriska confides that he was winging it the whole time, but Andrei comforts him and proposes that they work together - "You'll cast bells, I'll paint icons"
Somewhere in the middle of all this, the jester from the first chapter accosts Andrei and blames him for denouncing him, resulting in ten years in prison. He is about to hit Andrei with an axe when Kiril intercedes. The jester is mollified and goes back to drinking and dropping trou. Kiril reveals to Andrei that it was he who denounced the jester.
Then we get the Epilogue. And honestly, the real Rublev's art might be a work of genius for the time, but it's not my thing.
Overall, as usual with Tarkovsky, the images stay with you. And the actor who plays Andrei, Anatoly Solonitsyn, for whom this was his first role (he read the screenplay and traveled to Moscow on his own dime to insist to Tarkovsky that he was Andrei) is a marvel (you'll recognize him if you've seen any of Tarkovsky's later films, because he's in them up to Stalker, after which he dies of the same cancer that would later claim Tarkovsky and his wife) - incredibly soulful and expressive face. If it's ever showing on a big screen, that's definitely the way to see it.
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