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Lecture

Professor David Peimer
Eisenstein: His Life and Works, Including Extracts From Ivan the Terrible and Battleship Potemkin

Saturday 14.05.2022

Summary

David Peimer discusses the life of Russian filmmaker Sergei Eisenstein (1898–1948), focusing on his notable films, particularly Battleship Potemkin (1925), Ivan, the Terrible (1944, 1958), and Alexander Nevsky (1938). Eisenstein’s role as a pioneer in film theory, his exploration of historical stories, and the impact of his work, especially the concept of montage, are highlighted.

Professor David Peimer

head and shoulders portrait of david peimer looking at camera, smiling

David Peimer is a professor of theatre and performance studies in the UK. He has taught at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, and New York University (Global Division), and was a Fulbright Scholar at Columbia University. Born in South Africa, David has won numerous awards for playwriting and directing. He has written eleven plays and directed forty in places like South Africa, New York, Brussels, London, Berlin, Zulu Kingdom, Athens, and more. His writing has been published widely and he is the editor of Armed Response: Plays from South Africa (2009) and the interactive digital book Theatre in the Camps (2012). He is on the board of the Pinter Centre in London.

Brian De Palma in The Untouchables, the scene with the pram, and Kevin Costner grabs it at the last second, shoots. The shooting of the guy in the eye of Bugsy Siegel. Then there’s Woody Allen, uses a similar scene a couple of times, the step scene basically. And The Godfather, where Pacino and the daughter are walking down the steps, and they get shot by the killer from the bottom. And there’s so many others, I could go on.

Yes. There are certain scenes which Kubrick references them, without doubt.

Yes, wherever you have the idea of montage, it’s almost a cliche, and nobody really talks about it, but it originates with him.