Film review: Ivan the Terrible, Part II (1958)

If Alexander Nevsky is Eisenstein's Seven Samurai (bravura battle scenes, noble hero(s)), this film is his Throne of Blood, in that it's very Shakespearean and almost ridiculously stylized.  Now, why are we watching Part II without watching the first one, you might ask?  Because this is the only one that's in our box set.  And while the first film met with Stalin's approval, this one did not, probably because the titular Ivan is presented as friendless and paranoid, something said of Stalin at the time.  In fact, Part I was released in 1944 and Part II was finished in 1946, and Eisenstein was working on Part III, but the release of Part II was stopped (hence the 1958 release date) and all funding to Part III stopped.  So, Part II is confusing enough, but adding to the confusion is that it is a sequel to a film that we haven't seen and a prequel to a film that was never finished.

Okay, so a brief rundown of the plot.  Essentially Poland (not Germany this time) is plotting to control Russia.  The Poles (in particular, King Sigismund) are presented (in the most amazingly Liberace/Fifth Element outfits) 

as foppish and decadent, as well as sneering, effeminate and condescending.  Their plan is to collaborate with some Russian noble (boyar) or other to install him as Tsar after he bumps off Ivan.  

This is probably in the noble's interest because Ivan, in trying to unite all the principalities of Russia, is about to bump off most of them.  Meanwhile, Ivan is in exile 

sulking because his beloved wife died when he gave her wine that (unbeknownst to him) had been poisoned by his wicked aunt Yefrosinya Staritskaya, who wants her son Vladimir (who is not at all interested and as foppish as any Pole) to be Tsar.  Ivan is missing two old friends: one, Kurbsky, a prince and rather brutish general, and the other, formerly Fyodor Kolychev but now a monk named Philip.  After a flashback where we see Ivan's mother being poisoned (it's a trend) 

and Ivan installed as an intended puppet as a teen, when instead he stands up to the boyars and confiscates their lands and re-installs them as managers.  Cut back to the present and Philip arrives, and agrees to become Orthodox bishop of Moscow provided he has the right to intercede for condemned men.  But Ivan is persuaded to find a way round this and we see several nobles (including three of Philip's kinsmen) getting the axe (well, not on camera - you just see extreme closeups of neck 

and then cut to an axeman bringing down his axe).  In Part I Philip has started the oprichniki, which consists of a personal guard of loyal commoners (which is another thing that pisses off the boyars), and one of them helps Ivan work out that his wife was poisoned and that his aunt should be the main suspect.  Meanwhile, the boyars plead their case to Philip (still smarting from the betrayal of his kinsmen being offed).  Then there's a confusing interlude (to be honest, the whole film is a confusing interlude) with a play where children are acting (singing) as Shadrach, Mesach and Abednego and a small child confuses Ivan for Nebuchadnezzar.  Ivan throws a fit and says that that's what he'll be like and adopts the moniker of The Terrible.  This spurs the boyars to plan to assassinate him and a young man called Pyotr is blessed by Philip to perform this certainly fatal task.  And then the film becomes color!  And we're having a banquet, and Ivan gets Vladimir drunk and he gets a bit loose-lipped (and reminded me of a cross between Bill Hader and Stan Laurel), 

Ivan says he should try being Tsar for a while, and dresses him up as such and has him lead a procession into the cathedral... where Pyotr mistakes him for Ivan and stabs him.  A delighted Yefrosinya comes in and starts shouting about how it's good Ivan is dead... until the crowd parts and there's Ivan.  She nervously pokes him to see that he's real and then, dread dawning on her, she turns over her son, and clearly goes crazy, singing a song about a black beaver while cradling him.  Pyotr expects to be killed but vows not to give up his co-conspirators, but Ivan says that there's no reason to keep him because he's killed the Tsar's worst enemy.

But the plot isn't really what matters.  What matters is that the film looks astonishing.  It's like German Expressionist cinema on steroids.  

The lighting is stark.  The closeups are extreme.  

The blocking, whereby faces come into the frame, is so stylized as to prompt snorts of laughter.  The costumes are beyond imagination.  All of which is to cover up the fact that the film is just an hour and a half of plotting.  The contrast with the action of Alexander Nevsky is stark: everything is claustrophobic and the mood of paranoia is conveyed as much by the visuals as by the acting.  It's really a silent film by temperament, with the exaggerated expressions and overall artificiality that's typical of the more experimental silents.  Really watching it is more like visiting an art exhibition than watching a film with a plot.  But none-the-less recommended for that.