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Surrealism and Soviet Montage

What are the key elements of surrealism?
  • The exploration of the dream and unconsciousness as a valid form of reality, inspired by Sigmund Freud's writings. A willingness to depict images of perverse sexuality, scatology, decay and violence.
  • Surrealist films created a revolution in cinema by dispensing with linear narratives and plots, thereby freeing cinema from a reliance on traditional story-telling borrowed from literature. 
  • Surrealism creates the possibility of cinema itself as an independent and unique visual art form
  • Surrealist films do not merely retell dreams or stories but replicate their very processes through illogical, irrational disruptions and disturbing imagery, uncensored by normal wakeful consciousness or morality. 
  • Surrealist filmmakers found new techniques to convey the atmosphere and incongruous states of dreams. Like dreams, many Surrealist films resist interpretation. 
  • As in actual dreams, characters in Surrealist films display a lack of will, even a certain impotence. There is a forfeiting of control and a complete submission to the dream state.
  • Surrealist films often use shocking imagery that jolts the viewer, imagery that had not been seen in films prior to 1928. 
  • This challenges the notion of cinema as mere entertainment; the viewer can no longer be passive or complaisant. Surrealist film attempts to change cinema so that audiences experience more than the standard visuals.


In what ways is sexuality a key part of surrealism?Sexual violence was an ongoing theme. Max Ernst's La joie de vivre (1936) depicts an ominous jungle of the subconscious. Lurking in the jungle is a praying mantis. The praying mantis became a symbol for the Surrealists because in the act of mating the female devours the male. Women's sexuality was seen as evil and predatory. The Surrealists attempted to challenge the sexual taboos that predominated at the beginning of this century, but they were more interested in exploring violence then really questioning the taboos surrounding sexism and homophobia.

What is a montage (soviet)?Soviet montage theory is an approach to understanding and creating cinema that relies heavily upon editing (montage is French for "assembly" or "editing"). It is the principal contribution of Soviet film theorists to global cinema, and brought formalism to bear on filmmaking.

What is the purpose of a montage?Soviet montage is the editing of clips or photos together in order to get a certain point across. The goal of soviet montage is to create an idea which is clearer when all the images are viewed together than when they are viewed separately ( Johnson). Although only around 30 films have ever been made in this style, it is considered to be a very important and influential theory of film.

What role does sequencing and juxtaposition play in montage?The Kuleshov effect is a film editing (montage) effect demonstrated by Soviet filmmaker Lev Kuleshov in the 1910s and 1920s. It is a mental phenomenon by which viewers derive more meaning from the interaction of two sequential shots than from a single shot in isolation.

What is intellectual montage?For getting ideas across – rather than just stirring emotions – Eisenstein used ‘intellectual montage’. This is where images are combined to make comparisons and analogies, so in Strike shots of a cow being slaughtered are intercut with shots of workers being killed by troops. October also uses intellectual montage: in one sequence, For God and Country, Christian symbols are juxtaposed with religious artefacts from other cultures with the aim of suggesting that all religions are the same.

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