stalker

STALKER
Andrej Tarkovskij
STALKER
DIRECTED BY
WRITTEN BY
Andrej Tarkowskij
Arkady and Boris Strugatsky
Novel “Roadside Picknick” 1971
CINEMATOGRAPHY
Alexander Knjaschinski
EDITED BY
Ljudmila Feiginowa
PRODUCED BY
Aleksandra Demidova | MOSFILM
STARRING
Alexander Kaidanovsky
Anatoli Solonitsyn
Nikolai Grinko
RELEASE DATE
1979
COUNTRY
Soviet Union
BUGET
6.000.000 Rubels
~ 150.000 Euro
RUNNING TIME
163 min
ASPECT RATIO
1.375 : 1
AWARDS
Prize of the Ecumenical Jury - Cannes
andrej tarkovskij, 1978
SYNOPSIS
In outline „Stalker“ is one of the simplest films ever made: a guide, or Stalker, takes two
people, Writer and Professor, into a forbidden area called the Zone, at the heart of which is
the Room, where your deepest,darkest, innermost wish will come true. To enter the Room,
one must enter a Faustian bargain with one’s inner self.
Each of the characters is led to the Zone for very specific reasons, for the writer it is a quest
for inspiration, the professor is driven by his desire for knowledge and truth. The stalker as
there guide helps them enter, but starts struggling to retain his faith in “The Zone”, as he is
the only one who truly believes in it.
The Movie takes place in a small, unnamed industrial city somewhere in Russia. The nature
of the Zone is never truly revealed, it might be the result of a post-nuclear accident or extraterrestrial contamination. The fact is that it is heavily guarded by military, entry is forbidden
and countless myths have arisen about its alleged powers.
open space
the stalker
closed / limited space
the professor and the writer
limited space
open space
open space
closed space
deep space
flat space
CHARACTERISTIC SHOTS
CINEMATIC STYLE
Mise-En-Scène <-> Montage
- slow, long, uninterupted shots (“Plansequenz”)
- only continuity cuts, fluid and highly organic
- impression of a one take film
- “Sculpting in Time”, book by Tarkovskij, 1987
“Montage does in time what Mise-en-Scene does in space.
Both are organizational principles.”
Jean Luc-Godard
STALKER
163 MIN
Number of Shots
142
Average Shot Length
65 sec
INCEPTION
148 MIN
2757
3.1 sec
WERCKMEISTER HARMONIES
145 MIN
37
220 sec
STORYBOARD
“ENTERING THE ZONE”
ARCHITECTURAL RELEVANCE
“[...] the Piranesi’s of our time are the directors, the people
of the cinema: they describe the modern city, its centre and
its outskirts […] they were discovered first in cinema, rather
than by architects.”
Architect Aldo Rossi
spatial constitution of the zone also in relation to Michel
Foucaults concept of “Heterotopias” in “of other spaces”
Antonioni , Il deserto rosso, 1964