Ivan's Childhood (1962) with Revolutionary Left Radio and Amanda

Evan Intro: Hello and welcome to Left of the Projector. I am your host Evan,

Evan Intro: back again with another film discussion from the left.

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Evan Intro: You can also follow on all social media at Left of the Projector pod on Instagram and threads.

Evan Intro: This week on the show, we continue our series with Brett of RevLeft Radio and

Evan Intro: Amanda on the films of Andrei Tarkovsky.

Evan Intro: You may know by now that we've covered Stalker and Solaris, and we bring you

Evan Intro: the first feature film directed by Tarkovsky, and that is Ivan's Childhood. It was released in 1962.

Evan Intro: Ivan's Childhood delves into World War II from the perspective of a young child

Evan Intro: who has lost his entire family and is now spying for the Soviet partisans and Red Army.

Evan Intro: Brett and Amanda have been incredible partners in this ongoing series,

Evan Intro: helping me parse out, honestly, films that scholars have spent decades talking about.

Evan Intro: I've grown a deeper understanding of film and these sorts of films from the

Evan Intro: Soviet Union, Eastern Bloc, and other areas.

Evan Intro: It's really been a joy to have these ongoing conversations with Amanda and Brett.

Evan Intro: I hope you enjoyed this week's conversation on Ivan's childhood.

Evan: All right, well, Brett and And Amanda, thank you for coming back on the show

Evan: to talk about yet another Tarkovsky film.

amanda: Always a pleasure.

Brett: Yeah, absolutely. I'm happy to be back.

Evan: Yeah. And as everyone heard in the opening there, we're talking about Ivan's

Evan: Childhood, which is Andrei Tarkovsky's first full-length feature film, which came out in 1962.

Evan: And I think before we get into sort of the general talk about the film itself,

Evan: talk about some of the components that I think are pretty important,

Evan: I thought we kind of just start I'll start off with something a little lighter,

Evan: as you know, Tarkovsky films can be a little heavy, a lot of themes,

Evan: and this one is about the themes of World War II in the Soviet era.

Evan: So I thought I'd start off by just saying, if you could have dinner with an

Evan: actor living dead, it could be a director. Curious who you would pick, and...

Evan: Guess briefly why you would uh you'd choose them and it could be andre tarkovsky.

Brett: Okay i could take a shot of this first um i have

Brett: maybe one one director is pretty obvious um you know

Brett: stanley kubrick is one of my faves um love everything that that he's pretty

Brett: much put out 2001 a space odyssey one of my favorite films of all time um so

Brett: you know of course i'd be interested in talking to him but as an actor one of

Brett: my favorite actors that jumps to mind And as somebody I'm trying to work through the entire sort of, um,

Brett: you know, all the, the entire catalog of their work is, is Daniel Day-Lewis.

Brett: Um, only very recently started getting into him, um, on a couple of flights

Brett: I had in the last year or two.

Brett: I, I watched the entirety of, of his portrayal of Abraham Lincoln.

Brett: And then also finally watched There Will Be Blood.

Brett: Um, and I'm just, you know, one of those actors that is fascinating and captivating.

Brett: I'm not sure what there'd be to talk about. I mean, you know,

Brett: some of these people, you get them in a room and, you know, they're great artists

Brett: or they're a great actor, but they might not have a lot of the same shared interests.

Brett: But, you know, that jumps to mind. And then, of course, Nicolas Cage is another

Brett: interesting figure that I would like to sit down and chat with.

Evan: I think he would have something to say, Nicolas Cage, for sure.

Brett: Absolutely.

Evan: What about you, Amanda?

amanda: The first director that comes to mind is Inge M. Berman.

amanda: He's a Swedish director. he did The Seventh Seal, Wild Strawberries, a bunch of stuff.

amanda: I speak Swedish. I learned Swedish in college.

amanda: And so a lot of his films helped me learn. And it's kind of interesting that

amanda: this film in particular really reminds me a lot of The Seventh Seal.

amanda: If you haven't got an opportunity to see it, I'd highly recommend it.

amanda: And then as far as actors, this is a hard one because it's hard to decide.

amanda: I want to know what kind of person they are. I think,

amanda: Kind of an offhand one would be like Richard Gere, mostly because of his experience

amanda: going to Palestine and just kind of have a sit down conversation with him.

amanda: Because as you know, like actors are used oftentimes to push state propaganda.

amanda: And, you know, it's really propaganda in this case. And it kind of backfired.

amanda: So I really would like to have a conversation with him to kind of see where

amanda: that switch was, you know. And obviously, Nicolas Cage, I'm trying to piggyback off of you.

amanda: That guy, so I live in Portland, and he filmed a movie here called Pig.

amanda: Great movie. And we were kind of looking for him, hoping that we'd run into him.

amanda: Because we heard that he's notoriously bad with money. Maybe he would hook us

amanda: up because he thought we were cool or something.

amanda: Yeah we actually ate at the food carts yesterday that um a lot of the scenes

amanda: are filmed at or yeah the food carts and uh yeah just a centric guy you know very centric guy.

Evan: Yeah he's uh definitely a legend i was just talking about it with someone earlier

Evan: from the his new movie long legs but for for my pick since i kind of have to

Evan: think about this lot i think i would pick for the actor i I think I would go with Jane Fonda,

Evan: just because I've seen a lot of her early work.

Evan: And I know that just from a movie I watched, and I'm blanking on it at the moment,

Evan: she was supposed to be cast in a film, but was unmarried.

Evan: Chosen was not chosen because of her views on

Evan: uh palestine as being pro-palestinian and

Evan: so she was left out of the uh the she wasn't

Evan: called back for the for the movie and so you

Evan: know she's since the beginning of her career has gone out and

Evan: spoken been pretty outspoken about not just palestinian rights but

Evan: lots of other you know the various vietnam war

Evan: and things like that so be curious to see how those have influenced

Evan: her career and then from a director if i'm going to pick one of

Evan: each i'd probably go with paul verhoeven i'm a

Evan: huge fan of his you know more uh i guess american films you can think of starship

Evan: troopers and he's always been a favorite of mine so he would be probably one

Evan: of one of those in another in another episode i said stanley kubrick so i don't

Evan: want to repeat but that would be another i would love to these are all i mean

Evan: it can't really go wrong i suppose but um.

Brett: I don't know this is probably for for the uh exclusively for the terminally

Brett: online line, but did you recently see the Zionist online,

Brett: the Brianna Wu, her take on Starship Troopers, that it's not a mockery of fascism,

Brett: but it's actually a sincere portrayal of nationalism? Did you see that?

Evan: I did see that. I remember when there was this whole, I think,

Evan: I guess it was on Twitter and some other people were talking all about Starship Troopers.

Evan: And I did, one of my very first episodes of this podcast, maybe the 15th episode,

Evan: was on Starship Troopers, and I re-released it around the time that all of that

Evan: kind of discourse course is going on.

Evan: I'm like, I don't know anyone could watch that movie and not get it.

Evan: You have to be just obtuse to not... I don't know. It's...

Brett: Absolutely.

Evan: It's kind of crazy. I think there's a lot of movies I've done.

Evan: A lot of Verhoeven movies, like Robocop, I think people even,

Evan: don't realize is this uh.

Brett: What honorable one just jumped in my mind um humphrey

Brett: bogart oh i would love to to sit down and chat with him he's uh i don't know

Brett: i just love the old you know film noirs and just like a certain feeling you

Brett: get when you watch those old films and i just have always been captivated by

Brett: any movie that that he's in and just his acting and stuff is hypnotizing so

Brett: he's he's high on my list as.

Evan: Far as uh tarkovsky is concerned we've kind of stuck with some of the The original

Evan: two episodes we've done, we've done Solaris and Stalker, some of the later films in his career.

Evan: And now this, we're going back to 1962, which is Andrei Tarkovsky's very first feature film.

Evan: And there's kind of an interesting story that I'll kind of briefly mention,

Evan: just how he ended up directing the movie.

Evan: Apparently, it was an entire other group of people, a different director was

Evan: starting on the film, had written the screenplay, had, I think,

Evan: filmed some of the movie and they didn't like it.

Evan: They thought it was terrible. I guess these are most films or other people behind

Evan: the scenes. And so they fired him.

Evan: And someone that was one of Andrej Tarkovsky's mentors had told him about they're

Evan: looking for a new director for this movie.

Evan: And he literally applied, you know, through some kind of application process,

Evan: won the chance to direct it, rewrote most of the film.

Evan: And then when he submitted it to the Soviet Union to have it be reviewed,

Evan: he actually left out all of the dream sequences and also the love,

Evan: kind of the love interest scene from the script. So they didn't even know those

Evan: were going to be in the movie. He filmed them anyway.

Evan: They came, it came out and kind of the rest is history if you, if you will.

Evan: But I'm curious, being that this is a very different kind of movie than the

Evan: other two we've watched. And those are kind of longer, lots of single shots.

Evan: This is more, more or less traditional and kind of a, put that in quotation marks.

Evan: I don't think anything Andre Tarkovsky does is traditional, but in a traditional

Evan: sense of just kind of how more films at that time were done.

Evan: I'm curious, kind of your first impressions when you watched it before we get into it.

amanda: I think one of my first impressions is that I guess you don't really see a whole

amanda: lot of war films that aren't glorifying war.

amanda: And also are from a Soviet perspective. One thing that I could see throughout

amanda: it, even in like the character's eyes, was like trauma, you know?

amanda: The trauma of the war and even one of the soldiers is like, oh,

amanda: when the war is over, go see a doctor about those nerves, you know?

amanda: But I think, I'm really glad that we did this out of order just because this

amanda: is such a different film that it's not a complete representation of Tarkovsky

amanda: and his capabilities, But it is kind of sort of a creation story at the same time.

amanda: I mean, the Soviet identity dramatically changed after World War Two,

amanda: as you know, any traumatizing event would.

amanda: But yeah, that's my first impression.

Brett: Yeah, I agree that watching them out of order was interesting because you got

Brett: to sort of already know where his sort of cinematography and his art in general is going.

Brett: And then you can go back and visit his first ever film.

Brett: And one of the things that I noticed is the beautiful cinematography is absolutely there.

Brett: There this this very unique Tarkovsky esque way of, you know,

Brett: moving the camera of every image being a painting of, you know,

Brett: beautiful, beautiful camera work where, you know, this film could could have been a silent film.

Brett: Right. There could have been no dialogue and not a lot would have been stripped away.

Brett: Way like you could have made this this film without dialogue and

Brett: that's a testament to how you know just talented tarkovsky is

Brett: and how much emotion that he can evoke with very little dialogue just by using

Brett: the visual poetry of cinematography and then the other thing i noticed that

Brett: really struck me as is the the basic plot like if you you know from our previous

Brett: discussions on solaris and

Brett: stalker there is much more um ethereality

Brett: um much more surreality um ambiguity

Brett: in the plot in the temporal um

Brett: tone like you know the the chronological order in which the movies take place

Brett: uh you know sometimes you can sort of you're sort of uncertain about where the

Brett: plot is at any given moment etc but this this film was was much more straightforward

Brett: much more you know right down the middle as far as plot goes.

Brett: Right? Very chronological, very easy to follow.

Brett: And of course, I think that has its benefits when you're trying to work on a concept like war.

Brett: And of course, this is his first film, so maybe he doesn't feel as artistically

Brett: developed or free to move in the directions he later would move in.

Brett: But yeah, for a Tarkovsky film, this plot was very easy to sort of follow.

Brett: It was very chronological and lacked some of the more,

Brett: I wouldn't call them indulgences necessarily, but some of the more ethereal,

Brett: metaphorical, and symbolic stuff that would come later in his catalog of work.

Evan: It's interesting you mentioned that because I was watching an interview with

Evan: an author who wrote a book on a bunch of Tarkovsky films.

Evan: And she actually said, you know, she's obviously probably watched it hundreds

Evan: of times or many times to write a book on his films.

Evan: But she actually said something that's interesting. saying this is not necessarily counter to

Evan: what you're saying brett but it's i'm wondering what do you think of this the very

Evan: opening scene of the movie is uh kind of

Evan: uh you see ivan the as the child kind of um he's you know on an apple cart he's

Evan: it's you know this very beautiful nice kind of um music in the background it

Evan: kind of seems like oh this is a very beautiful film and then you're immediately

Evan: taken the opposite direction you see that this is now a dream he

Evan: wakes up in a barn and he's dirty and everything.

Evan: And so her theory or her comment was that you actually watching it only one

Evan: time, you are a little bit confused sometimes what is the reality just because

Evan: the cuts that he does sometimes are not very obvious. They just kind of immediately flip.

Evan: And so there is a little bit of confusion sometimes when there is a dream.

Evan: I think if you're watching closely and looking to analyze it,

Evan: maybe it's easier to tell.

Evan: But But I'm wondering if you think that that's actually, he does try and confuse

Evan: the audience a little bit in giving you these weird back and forth sequences.

Evan: And sometimes when he cuts, it'll be like a really close up and you don't really know where you are.

Evan: You don't know whether it's going to be another flashback or it's a different

Evan: flashback or it's modern time.

Evan: So I think that's where you see his future style in action, where he does still

Evan: try and give you that bit of kind of give the audience something they're not expecting, I guess.

Brett: Yeah, no, I agree with that. And in fact I had in my notes I didn't get to it

Brett: quite yet But with the exception of the dream scenes,

Brett: You know, because I think you're saying that there's that's the seed of what

Brett: would later become kind of, in some respect, entire films is this dreamy,

Brett: ethereal, you know, chronologically sort of confused and ambiguous way of doing things.

Brett: Those were sort of instantiated in these dream scenes.

Brett: And, yeah, the cutting back to real life and back to the dreams,

Brett: it did get confusing at certain times, especially on your first watch.

Brett: I'm sure if you go back on the second watch, you can really nail that down.

Brett: But for me, it just felt like this, you know, it's it's it's it's literally

Brett: a shift from dreaming into reality.

Brett: But reality is a nightmare. And so you're he he has these dreams of a sort of childhood deferred.

Brett: Are they actual memories from his childhood or are they sort of dreamy reminisce,

Brett: you know, a sort of nostalgia for something that never was because he was stripped

Brett: of his childhood? I don't exactly know.

Brett: But the dream world is the only world that Ivan can enter where he still has a childhood.

Brett: And then he wakes up into the nightmare of the adult world, you know,

Brett: lost his both his parents, lost his sister to the Nazis.

Brett: And so I had that dream reality back and forth. And yeah, they blur together

Brett: the way that they're edited or such that you don't exactly know.

Brett: Exactly where you are in any given moment. It takes a second to orient yourself.

Brett: And there's just this, yeah, this oscillation between the dreams of a childhood

Brett: that Ivan and all children deserve and then the nightmare reality of war.

Evan: Yeah, definitely. I think that's well said. And one of the things I was thinking

Evan: about, I've seen, I think when I was right after college, I went through a phase

Evan: of watching lots and lots of war movies, World War II, Vietnam.

Evan: Maybe not at the time I wasn't watching movies like this, but I think of how

Evan: many movies there are about World War Two, and sometimes it's,

Evan: you know, a specific unit or, you know, a rescue mission or the,

Evan: you know, the beaches of Normandy, all these different things.

Evan: But this is not any of those things.

Evan: It's kind of something altogether different. It's based on a book.

Evan: And it's, you know, we see the war through the eyes of a child going back and

Evan: forth, as you said, between kind of the realities, the cruel reality of the

Evan: real world and war and then the, you know, this dream or, you know,

Evan: what you wish life could be like.

Evan: I'm curious what you think that makes it, you know, in a way it's risky to make

Evan: something like this. It's not like other war movies.

Evan: And I'm wondering what makes it, I don't know, compelling or what makes it different?

Evan: And do you think it is, can you think of any other, you know,

Evan: war type movies where they really kind of press this button of,

Evan: you know, childhood and youth or even just avoid, there's no battle scenes there's

Evan: no the only shooting you really see are flares in the air a few times and you

Evan: hear some gunfire but there's no actual war like you're you're only seeing the result of war.

amanda: Well there is there is some bombs that do go off

amanda: i i actually re-watched it and i

amanda: was like oh yeah there's there's there's some bombs that do go off when

amanda: they're in like the trenches kind of about three quarters of the way

amanda: through i think right um but that's pretty much it um

amanda: the perspective of like being from it's

amanda: more humanizing i think it's not the movie's

amanda: not so much about like the war as

amanda: much because it's just a lot of dialogue and

amanda: a lot of human interaction um i think it's like the emotional emotional

amanda: part of war i guess the the trauma as i stated

amanda: before and doing it through a child's perspective that

amanda: is forced to be part of the resistance um

amanda: forced to sacrifice their actual childhood to

amanda: seek revenge and throughout the film you notice

amanda: that like the older characters are trying to kind

amanda: of like maintain his innocence trying to maintain his childhood in a way of

amanda: like no kid you need to go to military school you know like you need to go to

amanda: boarding school or whatever um and so it's just a very humanized uh aspect which is

amanda: something that actually was starting to happen a lot in Soviet film in the sixties.

amanda: Um, and so, um.

amanda: That's, I guess that's what kind of makes a difference, not specifically about,

amanda: because you don't really actually know where they're at.

amanda: If they are in Russia, I mean, at the end, you see that they're at,

amanda: you know, wherever the headquarters of all these Nazis are.

amanda: I really like the use of real, real scene footage towards the end when they,

amanda: you know, took out the Nazis. That's just always exciting.

amanda: But yeah, it's a very humanized aspect.

Brett: Yeah. And to add to that, you know, definitely movies jump to mind.

Brett: There's like the classic American way of doing these World War Two sort of movies,

Brett: which I think Evan was alluding to.

Brett: Very straightforward, very much like here's this one platoon.

Brett: Let's follow them. You know, Saving Private Ryan, Black Hawk Down,

Brett: you know, kind of like action movies that don't really get too deep into.

Brett: I mean, they're good films in their own right, but they don't really get too

Brett: deep into the psychology, much less these sort of different lenses,

Brett: like a childhood lens, for example.

Brett: Speaking of Kubrick, you can think of Full Metal Jacket, which had obviously

Brett: humor that this film lacks, but also just the psychology of the soldiers themselves.

Brett: It dove a little deeper while still having that action element.

Brett: So it was a fun watch, but also a criticism of the war in and of itself and

Brett: a diving into like, you know, that one soldier who goes sort of crazy and,

Brett: you know, blows his own brains out that that psychology there.

Brett: But this is very unique that it's so much through the lens of a child.

Brett: Of a war orphan, right? He was orphaned by the war.

Brett: This dream sequences, as I was saying earlier, that allude back to the childhood

Brett: he might have had at one point or should have had in a just world.

Brett: World and then you know to amanda's point at the end when there's

Brett: like that footage of of you know the the soviets

Brett: winning and taking over nazi headquarters etc

Brett: i think it's it's not a coincidence that

Brett: tarkovsky again shows dead children um he

Brett: shows how the nazis killed their own children so there's

Brett: that one scene of gerbils lined up next to all of his

Brett: dead children and then another nazi commander i'm not sure who they

Brett: were referring to who um shot all his

Brett: kids in the attic and then hung himself and so

Brett: you know when we're talking about seeing it through

Brett: the childhood lens obviously the the lens

Brett: of ivan and from a pro-soviet which any human being

Brett: should have in this context especially a pro-soviet um

Brett: you know perspective but then at the end like yeah nazis are are brutalizing

Brett: children by starting this war brutalizing children all all around europe but

Brett: the nazis themselves are sort of brutalizing um their own children in a sense

Brett: They start this insane manic war for these fascistic expansionary reasons.

Brett: And it all leads with their defeat and then to murder your own children.

Brett: I think there's a separate question there of...

Brett: You know it made me think in the moment like if you're in those circumstances,

Brett: like wouldn't you still want to give your kids a chance at

Brett: life like um you know like yeah you're going

Brett: to be punished you can kill yourself etc um i

Brett: guess there could be some fears about like you know pillaging or

Brett: something when the soviets come in there's lots of lots of

Brett: um discussion on both

Brett: sides of that war about the atrocities being committed by

Brett: the others there's a little fear there that maybe death is less

Brett: of a punishment for your children than what could come but in

Brett: most instances you can't imagine entire platoons of

Brett: people coming in and just you know murdering children unless they're

Brett: israeli or something but um sad as sad as that is um but yeah just the the moral

Brett: question of of murdering your own children but that's that's not really pondered

Brett: in the film it's just the the stark reality of of of the war itself traumatizing

Brett: ivan and other children like

Brett: him but then the nazis themselves um exterminating their

Brett: own children and just like that that reinforcing that

Brett: lens of trying to see the absurdity and the irrationality and the brutality

Brett: of war and the way you highlight that best is to try to see it through the the

Brett: eyes of of fundamentally uh you know sort of ontologically innocent beings you

Brett: know children so i i found that to be interesting yeah i.

Evan: Think it was the first word that i wrote down in my notes i wrote you know,

Evan: a child's wonderment and innocence.

Evan: And that kind of, to me, is the word that describes the movie.

Evan: I think you, Amanda, said the people, the other soldiers want Ivan to have kind

Evan: of a quote-unquote normal life where he can keep this innocence,

Evan: that they want to prevent him from continuing to be this sort of spy behind enemy lines.

Evan: And it's just, I think what makes it such a different kind of war film,

Evan: It takes place during a war, but I almost don't even like to say it's a war

Evan: film in the way we've been talking about it.

Evan: It's that innocence that they're trying to withhold.

Evan: And that's what those dream sequences are showing you. They're showing you that

Evan: once upon a time, Ivan did have this innocence.

Evan: He loved his mother. They went apple picking.

Evan: They picked water from the well. They had this sort of normal life.

Evan: And it's the war that kind of took that all away. and he's led him to being

Evan: bitter and angry and want vengeance to do whatever he can to avenge.

Evan: As you said, being an orphan, he's lost that innocence.

Evan: And there's lots of moments throughout the movie where they try and give him

Evan: a bunch of comics or kids' magazines.

Evan: And he's like, I've read all those.

Evan: And all the attempts to try and give him any sense of normalcy is just always just stripped away.

Evan: And I think that's part of the impact of war is that you can shield yourself,

Evan: even like those Nazi children. you know they're kind of shielded from what's

Evan: going on but at the end of the day they also suffer everyone suffers.

Brett: To add to that um the the way that the the older soldiers are portrayed is also

Brett: obviously as amanda was saying incredibly humanizing um but they all were rallied

Brett: around the shared love and protection of the boy um and and there's like this

Brett: broader metaphor of of you know,

Brett: a whole people trying simultaneously to shield the boy from the terrors in the

Brett: sense of like, you should go to school, not be on the front lines.

Brett: But also at the same time, just doing whatever they can to protect the boy.

Brett: And there's a deeper sense that in war, like this war is happening in some sense

Brett: to protect the future, to defend everything that is most sacred and holy for

Brett: a community, for a nation, for a people, which is represented in their children,

Brett: which is, you you know, the future of this entire society, this way of being.

Brett: The Nazi children were killed in the end. The Nazi regime was coming to an end.

Brett: And for the Nazis, for Goebbels and Hitler and, you know, all these others,

Brett: they were picturing this thousand-year Reich and their children,

Brett: you know, trying to breed these Aryan, you know, children to have this future that they imagined.

Brett: That was destroyed by them starting World War II and ultimately losing it.

Brett: And so I can see the dead Nazi children at the end as kind of reminiscent of

Brett: that as well, but the soldiers, the lieutenants.

Brett: Protecting this boy um spending so much time trying

Brett: to protect him trying to put him on a right path even though the

Brett: the context in which they're operating in makes that sort of

Brett: impossible i think was a was a kind of a beautiful element

Brett: of the film um and you can't watch this film and i mentioned israel earlier

Brett: sort of flippantly but don't get me wrong like you can't watch this film without

Brett: thinking about what's going on in palestine right now and that this exact trauma

Brett: is being inflicted on children en masse as we speak.

Brett: You know, some recent numbers coming out of Palestine suggest that over 150,000,

Brett: 180,000 human beings have been murdered at this point.

Brett: And Gaza is 50% people under 18 years old, so children.

Brett: And so you're talking tens of thousands of children.

Brett: And the ones that are surviving often will be missing one or both of their parents.

Brett: Many have lost their entire families their entire

Brett: extended families and that's why you

Brett: know we talk about israel as the nazis of our time

Brett: they're perpetuating the same sort of brutality and cruelty and it's the children

Brett: of that society that really bear the the horrors of it because they're sort

Brett: of fundamentally innocent and the least capable intellectually to deal with that And so,

Brett: you know, I did think about Palestine the entire time.

Brett: And the last thing I'll say on this point is it reminds me of this James Baldwin

Brett: quote that I think really kind of gets at what we're talking about here, too.

Brett: Baldwin said, quote, The children are always ours, every single one of them all over the globe.

Brett: And I am beginning to suspect that whoever is incapable of recognizing this

Brett: may be incapable of morality itself. self.

Brett: And I've always loved that quote. I think it's beautiful.

Brett: And I think it really speaks to what we're talking about here in seeing the

Brett: children of humanity as our children,

Brett: all of our children, and that anybody with a developed, mature sense of morality

Brett: needs to see the children of the world as not Palestinian children or Arab children

Brett: or Russian children or German children,

Brett: but as human children that we all have a deep responsibility for.

Brett: And one of the ways in which that responsibility is completely abandoned is

Brett: when we bring down the whores of war on top of the heads of fundamentally innocent children.

amanda: Absolutely and all wars are always a war on children yes and and also makes

amanda: me like the going back to how the nazis um you know they killed their own children

amanda: um you know there is a line you know like any loss of life is is a tragedy but

amanda: killing kids fucking sucks.

amanda: Beyond anything, you know, but, you know, I think about like with Israel,

amanda: like, um, you know, one of the hostages was returned safely after the father

amanda: thought his daughter was dead.

amanda: And he was actually kind of like relieved thinking that she was dead because

amanda: it's that, that mentality that it's better to die than being taken hostage,

amanda: um, because of just the generations and generations

amanda: of hate being taught um which

amanda: is very reminiscent of how you know children of the

amanda: nazis were taught to think about jews you know and um the hannibal directive

amanda: is something that has now been shown to be implemented on october 7th and it's

amanda: just it's the parallels are just you can't not recognize it um it's yeah so.

Brett: Absolutely and how zionism itself um teaches children from a very young age

Brett: to hate muslim arab palestinians um to dehumanize them and so you have like

Brett: these interviews that come out sometimes of young kids you know um just just

Brett: regurgitating the most insane.

Brett: Fascistic anti-human rhetoric as

Brett: if it's just common sense because this this

Brett: fascistic settler colonial society has inculcated

Brett: this barbarity into the minds of their

Brett: children which in and of itself is a form of brutalizing children

Brett: which your own children by teaching them this hatred

Brett: this this fundamental division this dehumanization of the other um that is also

Brett: child abuse you're literally murdering palestinian children and you're sort

Brett: of stunting or murdering the psychology and the moral development of your own

Brett: children to keep this fucking insane project going um and And it's just,

Brett: it is absolutely disgusting.

Brett: And the fact that so many people in this world, especially, I mean,

Brett: in the imperial core in the West, seem to lack moral clarity on this point is

Brett: just absolutely fucking astounding.

Brett: And, you know, people that really fancy themselves intellectuals and morally

Brett: deep thinkers, you know, I mean, Sam Harris, for example, wrote an entire book

Brett: on morality and how we can root morality in a sort of scientific objective,

Brett: a basis or whatever. And he's just a full on Zionist.

Brett: And, you know, these people are fucking sick in the head, but they fancy themselves

Brett: like truly deep moral thinkers while they do everything but condemn the mass

Brett: slaughter of innocent human beings, families, and importantly, children.

Brett: So it's just stark to see that, you know, in real time.

Evan: And just from a, from like a personal note, just as people maybe have,

Evan: maybe I mentioned other episodes and across of our episode with Intervention Pod,

Evan: where we talked about kind of the having myself grown up as a Jewish person

Evan: going to a, you know, a Jewish school and being pushed all of these Zionist kind of lies and myths.

Evan: Maybe not to the point of seeing, you know, Muslims and Arabs as lesser people,

Evan: but, you know, going to Israel, participating in a multiple day IDF program.

Evan: I mean, they very much, I mean, I won't go too deep into this.

Evan: Us. You could spend a whole hour as we did.

Evan: But it's very easy to see how you can create these myths about people.

Evan: And you could see how, when I think about those Nazi children that are killed

Evan: at the end, I mean, they would perpetuate the same lies and beliefs about Jews,

Evan: that the Jews are now going and doing it against Arabs and Muslims.

Evan: So it's really just a pattern too, where it's also impossible to separate that.

Evan: I hate to use the word conflict, but what's going on in Palestine and Gaza to this movie.

Evan: So I'm glad you both brought it up and I think it's an important point.

amanda: Yeah. There's also this Naomi Klein quote.

amanda: I'm sure you all have heard about it and seen her book, Doppelganger,

amanda: which I haven't fully read, but essentially saying that the Zionist mentality,

amanda: that is taught is not the freedom of oppression, but the freedom to be the oppressor, something like that.

amanda: I'm kind of butchering it, but that's definitely on par.

Evan: The way we were taught about all of the various wars, the Yom Kippur War,

Evan: the 67, all these different ones was that Israel, of course,

Evan: was the victim and had to defend itself as we see being perpetuated to this day.

Evan: But on a separate note, there's one theme that then I'm going to wait on it

Evan: because I think it's, uh, I'm going to leave it alone.

Evan: And that's, although maybe it does kind of fit into what I'm going to mention

Evan: now is I saw an article online that referred to Ivan's childhood as,

Evan: you know, a film about kind of like the tree of life.

Evan: There's lots of moments in this movie where I think trees are very intentional

Evan: and important to the plot.

Evan: And I think it goes into something else I had seen about it talking about the movie as kind of a.

Evan: Can be viewed as this different form or these various

Evan: forms of dualities the child's idealism versus

Evan: kind of the cruel reality of war which i think we've already talked about but

Evan: i think it's uh very interesting to look at that perspective when it comes to

Evan: how they use trees so the very opening scene you see some apple trees and you

Evan: see ivan sort of floating above the trees and then immediately they show him

Evan: kind of uh at root level literally where you You see dirt and roots of those trees from the ground,

Evan: and then it flashes to the current time.

Evan: And several times throughout the film, there is a scene in a grove of birchwood trees, yes.

Evan: There's a couple of scenes in a field of birchwood.

Evan: And then there's also a moment when Ivan wakes up from one of his nightmares

Evan: or dream sequences, and he immediately sees there's a log of a birchwood kind

Evan: of behind him before it kind of brings you back to reality.

Evan: And then at the very kind of the last moments of the movie, you have him going

Evan: through the swamp on the German side, you know, through these large trees that

Evan: are just growing in muck and dirt.

Evan: And they're kind of having to get their way through into the Nazi side.

Evan: You know, maybe representing the evils of the Nazis. So I'm curious if you noticed

Evan: any of those aspects of trees in it at all.

Evan: And if there's anything to that, you know, I don't put anything that Tarkovsky does as accidents.

Evan: And especially also brings me to kind of my question that you could also answer

Evan: a part of this is there's this sort of random moment around 30 minutes in of

Evan: this little love story amongst Masha,

Evan: who's a nurse and her, you know, commanding officer or a commanding officer

Evan: that seemingly doesn't really fit into the rest of the movie.

Evan: It's kind of like a little mini vignette that's i mean i'm curious what

Evan: you both think to see if it doesn't fit or if it does

Evan: fit but it takes place in that birch field and that moment where the the the

Evan: general not the general the lieutenant kisses masha is over sort of a pit where

Evan: you see the kind of the roots of those same trees so all of those things kind

Evan: of fit together to me as as something and i'm not maybe sure what it is well.

amanda: On the on the topic of birchwood um,

amanda: just doing like i i was really curious about because i was

amanda: reading your notes and i didn't really notice like how prominent they

amanda: are throughout i mean even like one of the cabins or

amanda: the shelters is made out of that same birchwood i

amanda: think right um and so i kind

amanda: of was like okay what's the symbolism of this and so i think like

amanda: birchwood is i guess it's a pretty prominent in russia

amanda: um it symbolizes femininity and um

amanda: fertility warms kindness peace tranquility and

amanda: harmony they use it a lot in paintings and

amanda: art and stuff like that and as you said like Tchaikovsky is

amanda: nothing is accidental so I think

amanda: that that yeah just kind of like okay so the best way I could like compare it

amanda: is so I'm Mexican and like we're we're all about corn maize you know we come

amanda: from from the corn um it's a really it's a staple of like how our people survived there's like entire,

amanda: analogs written about tortillas and um i've read them all um but i think that

amanda: it's kind of like with that you know like um birchwood is like a symbol of russian

amanda: pride russian um i guess nationalism whatever i tread lightly on that um because

amanda: that could be taken one way or another.

amanda: But I just kind of think of it as like, yeah, that's like the symbol of,

amanda: Of Russia, of the Russian identity, I guess.

Brett: Yeah, that's that's interesting. For sure. I didn't know that had that meaning

Brett: in those sort of cultural signifiers in that society. That's fascinating.

Brett: Yeah, I mean, I always love one of the best things about watching a Tarkovsky

Brett: film is this this profound eye for nature that he has,

Brett: how he in every film that I've seen of his so far has these long lingering scenes

Brett: where he keeps the camera on nature is always sort of placing human nature in

Brett: the broader context of the natural world.

Brett: Writ large um there's an interesting this is one of those things i'm not quite

Brett: sure what to make of it as amanda like he was alluding to like you know it means

Brett: something but you're not quite sure in the very opening scene um ivan is in

Brett: like this you know i think it's a yeah one of those forests.

Brett: And he comes face to face with like a spider web and is

Brett: sort of like you know interested in it whatever and then

Brett: later in the film masha um walks by

Brett: like a tree that's the exact same type of tree and um

Brett: kind of freaks out about cobwebs and steps back and she's

Brett: like i'm i'm only scared of spiders um so the

Brett: sort of like this this um natural thing

Brett: this spider the spider web it's at

Brett: one it's at one point delightful for the child um

Brett: that is uh sort of innocent in a

Brett: way of like not of just sort of like you know garden of eden

Brett: style innocence and then as a later more

Brett: developed up to mature person learns that this

Brett: is a is a threat or a danger and can kind of jump back from

Brett: it again not quite sure what that means but probably something

Brett: he's trying to say there um with the with regards

Brett: or i'll get to the love the love thing in a second with with

Brett: masha and the kiss but one quote i found very illuminating regarding tarkovsky

Brett: and how he does images as we're wrestling with the meaning of certain things

Brett: um there's this quote where he says quote We can express our feelings regarding

Brett: the world around us either by poetic or by descriptive means.

Brett: I prefer to express myself metaphorically. Let me stress, metaphorically, not symbolically.

Brett: A symbol contains within itself a definite meaning, certain intellectual formula,

Brett: while a metaphor is an image, an image possessing the same distinguishing features

Brett: as the world it represents.

Brett: An image, as opposed to a symbol, is indefinite in meaning.

Brett: One cannot speak of of an infinite world by applying tools

Brett: that are definite and finite we can analyze the formula

Brett: that constitutes a symbol while metaphor is a being

Brett: within itself um and it

Brett: it falls apart at any attempt of touching it end quote so i think that's kind

Brett: of interesting and in that regard if you would take him at his word and then

Brett: assume that he's doing that here um there is sort of a non-meaning it's just

Brett: sort of meant to be an image that evokes feeling um and tries to get at the infinite space,

Brett: and indefinite sort of aspects of human life which i found very interesting

Brett: you know kubrick is different i think kubrick does a lot of symbols like kubrick

Brett: is putting things in his film that have definite meanings he's trying to get

Brett: you to catch on to these little easter eggs of meaning,

Brett: and it's sort of interesting to think of tarkovsky as we've described him in

Brett: previous episodes as a sort of anti-kubrick in a way where he just sort of steps

Brett: back from even that meaning and just sort just has the image itself playing a role.

Brett: So it's really, really hard to say. I'm interested to hear what both of you

Brett: think about it, but I'll get to the Masha point in a second if either of you

Brett: have any thoughts on that.

Evan: Yeah, that's kind of a separate. I just brought them up because of the moment

Evan: when they're in those trees.

Evan: But yeah, I think the article that I didn't fully finish reading it,

Evan: the kind of where it talks about the trees of life, it also actually mentioned

Evan: the spider moment you're talking about too.

Evan: And I really liked that line that she's only afraid of

Evan: spiders you know you're literally in a war scenario against

Evan: uh the nazis and the thing you fear is spiders you

Evan: don't fear you know you don't fear nazis you don't fear all these other

Evan: things but i think that the you know the it seemed like

Evan: all of the different trees did have different kind

Evan: of just the way they looked and i think that quote kind of puts that

Evan: into light is that they evoke different things in those

Evan: different times you also see the scene where uh they go

Evan: across the river and they see a several of their comrades have

Evan: been hung they're hanging from a tree i don't

Evan: know if i recall what kind of tree it was but you now you

Evan: see you know that moment i think there's also a time when

Evan: the um when ivan is talking to that

Evan: sort of older man you know outside of the ruins of his house and he's looking

Evan: for a little nail to hang up a picture which is also a really great scene we

Evan: can also talk about and i think there's a moment where they show a tree behind

Evan: it too so there are all these moments where they use these trees not simply

Evan: as symbols but to kind of evoke something as you're watching it.

Evan: And I think they're, you know, as Tarkovsky does in all of these,

Evan: in all of the movies I've seen, it's just, it makes you, you can watch it three

Evan: different times. I think have three different feelings each time you watch,

Evan: you know, those, those scenes, which I think is what makes it so, them so powerful.

Evan: But I don't know if you, if you have something to add, Amanda,

Evan: we can, if not, I guess we could talk about the, the kiss too.

amanda: Yeah. You know, Brett, I didn't actually really put two and two together with

amanda: the cobwebs, like in the beginning with Ivan and then with Masha.

amanda: And, And now that I'm thinking, like taking that and like, oh,

amanda: that's got to mean something, you know, there's a few things,

amanda: a couple of things that I think about with that, like cobwebs.

amanda: I think about how in order for a spider to build a cobweb, there has to be some

amanda: sort of calm and time, you know, a short period of time.

amanda: I don't really know where I would go with that, but I just, how do spiders build cobwebs?

amanda: That's my ADHD brain, like, oh, that's going to be researched later.

amanda: But I also think about Ivan and Masha, like those two characters, like Ivan and,

amanda: I don't know. I know that Masha's older, but she has such a childlike quality to her.

amanda: Also, I guess an air of innocence that Ivan also have.

amanda: And they're kind of both on different reactions to the war.

amanda: I don't really know what she does. I guess by default, she's kind of a nurse

amanda: or something, which is kind of very gender specific, but whatever.

amanda: But those two characters, I just

amanda: really feel like they both have an air of innocence to them and it's don't feel

amanda: like it's too much of a coincidence that they both encounter cobwebs at different

amanda: points where he sees it and then she runs into it um yeah we could walk we could

amanda: probably make a whole podcast on just that.

Evan: Totally yeah i was just gonna add one thing there's actually i'll link to this

Evan: article i think it's pretty fascinating there's one moment when ivan is walking

Evan: through a bunch of kind of the ruins of a house and all of the pieces of wood

Evan: that are kind of broken apart look very much like a web,

Evan: which again, can't be, you know, has to be intentional or it's kind of the same visual kind of sense.

Evan: And so I think there must be more to that too that, you know,

Evan: that I think is fascinating. But yeah, go ahead.

Brett: Yeah, there's this oscillation with the trees between the delicate nature of

Brett: them and the brute nature of them.

Brett: So like I think of the cobweb, obviously,

Brett: being like this delicate structure that is pinned to a tree that

Brett: even a strong gust of wind could sort of disturb the

Brett: delicacy of that of that web and then masha

Brett: sort of when they're out in the forest with the lieutenant she's sort

Brett: of like nimbly walking on one of the branches and walking back down it um sort

Brett: of in this very like balanced and and delicate way but on the other hand you

Brett: have like the nooses so on the same sort of you know a tree can hold the delicacy

Brett: of a spider web It can also have the brute force of hanging somebody by the neck until they die.

Brett: And then when they're in the swamp sort of like at nighttime or on the edge

Brett: of the river in the marsh at nighttime, doing their little operation,

Brett: as it were, towards the end of the film, one of the trees just tips over in the water.

Brett: And, you know, you have all like the artillery shells in the background or the flares or whatever.

Brett: And then you just have this huge tree fall over and it doesn't come close to

Brett: the boat, but there's just this brute nature of it falling, splashing in the

Brett: water, making this huge impact.

Brett: And so, again, this sort of oscillation between the delicacy of nature,

Brett: the delicate, limber, balanced form of it, and, you know, the way that human

Brett: beings can use or destroy it at the same time.

Brett: So I thought that was interesting. And the other thing I wanted to say with

Brett: regards to Masha and the little love situation they have here,

Brett: which you said that some people criticize as sort of being irrelevant or unnecessary,

Brett: I kind of see it as, one, deepening the personal character of the lieutenant.

Brett: You can see this other aspect of him outside of simply protecting Ivan or simply

Brett: playing his role in the war.

Brett: Um but also there is this tension between

Brett: the two lieutenants that are watching over Ivan I don't know

Brett: if they're two tenants colonels whatever captains um the

Brett: younger one and the older one um where the

Brett: younger one does seem to have some tension with regards

Brett: to Masha but never overtly tries never makes

Brett: a pass at Masha never makes it clear that he's flirting with

Brett: her um but when he finds out that that her

Brett: and the other lieutenant are out in the woods together he starts

Brett: running after them um and i'm not sure what

Brett: that means there's like almost a fear in the way that he runs is he running

Brett: to break up some sort of love scene is is he worried that masha might be in

Brett: danger in the hands of the other captain or lieutenant when they finally meet

Brett: up the two men um nothing is really set nothing is said between them nothing is made clear but.

Brett: It's sort of a question mark of why the younger one runs in to the woods with

Brett: such ferocity, only to find the other captain and not really do much about it.

Brett: So I don't know exactly know what that is.

Brett: There seems to be something like a brewing love triangle there,

Brett: but also that is subordinated between the two men,

Brett: at least with their with their shared goal of like protecting and caring for

Brett: Ivan and perhaps to make that love triangle.

Brett: Um an overt thing that that causes division

Brett: between them would put into a compromising

Brett: position their shared goal of protecting Ivan so I don't know I was just kind

Brett: of playing with those ideas and if if if I'm on the right track there then you

Brett: know that's not that's not a meaningless aside but that is a sort of deepening

Brett: um of the overall narrative that Tarkovsky is purposely trying to do and show us so I.

amanda: Think also the the younger lieutenant or

amanda: whatever he is I kind of also get the

amanda: impression that because they seem like they're

amanda: close in age that there's some sort of kinship

amanda: with that i don't know if it's romantic or if it's just you know because it's

amanda: someone that is his age um but there's also been criticism that the scene was

amanda: like sexual assault you know borderline sexual assault and you know i i hate

amanda: to be like well times were different then but the times were different then.

amanda: People's perception of what's romantic.

amanda: And I looked for, you know, in watching that scene, and then she runs into her old college peer.

amanda: She looks longingly into the forest, looking for perhaps the younger guy,

amanda: perhaps the, what's his name, Holen? Holen?

amanda: Colon i think they pronounce it like colon or something like that

amanda: i don't know i think i think to say

amanda: like i see comments like online because i follow like the

amanda: turkovsky like um instagram and he

amanda: posts like video clips or they post

amanda: because because turkovsky is dead um they post

amanda: video clips and they posted that scene some people are like oh so

amanda: romantic and other people like sexual assaults and

amanda: it's like yeah i don't i don't know you know

amanda: never read the comments but sometimes times um it is

amanda: and i think you also i don't know if you mentioned this

amanda: uh evan but i think you mentioned your notes about it

amanda: being like oh yeah you did um about how he like

amanda: kind of scoops her up and they're kind of over this abyss

amanda: type this trench kind of deal

amanda: um i don't know i don't really know what to make of it um but it does feel a

amanda: little strange the scene does feel a little strange because of like i don't

amanda: know she seems like she's not really into it but then she seems really into

amanda: i don't know it's like it's it's a little uncomfortable um but well the i don't know the.

Evan: Trench aspect the trench aspect i think makes it what i think is probably the

Evan: most interesting aspect i mean it's kind of i don't know the scenes maybe eight

Evan: minutes long something like that but one of the opening scenes with ivan is

Evan: you see him kind of uh walking along sort of a trench

Evan: area there's kind of a uh i think it's right before in this very opening dream

Evan: sequence to kind of show the roots of the trench or something like that to me it almost seemed like,

Evan: masha being sort of saved or kept innocent in the same way they want to keep

Evan: ivan you know his innocence you know from falling into kind of like the trenches

Evan: of war you know maybe it's you know.

amanda: If if.

Evan: She was uh romantically involved she could you know leave the war and not have

Evan: to be you know know, be part of it anymore.

Evan: And I don't know really what to make bread of the lieutenant running.

Evan: To me, it also felt like this weird fatherly instinct or brotherly instinct.

Evan: I mean, I know they're the same age, so fatherly doesn't sound right.

Evan: But initially, the lieutenant doesn't seem to be wanting to care for Ivan.

Evan: It's kind of like this weird thing he has to do. He doesn't even really believe

Evan: he is who he is, that he's this spy for the Soviets.

Evan: And then over the course of the rest of the film, he becomes protective of him, helping him,

Evan: you know, trying to watch out out for him and eventually goes

Evan: along on his final mission with him so i think maybe the

Evan: lieutenant's running because he's uh you know

Evan: has that same protective feeling of masha as he does for uh ivan so i don't

Evan: know i also don't think the scene is uh you know out of place i mean it it feels

Evan: slightly out of place but i don't think that the meaning and and what it could

Evan: be is uh i think it would be a disservice to not have it yeah.

Brett: Some um hanging over the ditch and kissing yeah you can

Brett: make many different um it's a beauty it's a fascinating image where she's just

Brett: sort of dangling over the abyss and he's you know grabbing her holding her up

Brett: and kissing her something about the impulse of of love or the the romantic ideal

Brett: even in the in the brutality of war,

Brett: But yeah, it's like, is she just playing coy or is this like sort of a creepy

Brett: ass situation? It's kind of hard to say.

Brett: There's probably, I mean, this is the 60s and 70s, so I'm not exactly sure what

Brett: you can expect from male directors at that time, but there's probably almost

Brett: certainly a feminist critique of Tarkovsky's portrayal of women in general.

Brett: I remember, I believe it's in Stalker where the wife was just very hysterical

Brett: and fraught and didn't have a lot of dimension to her personality.

Brett: Personality and masha has this similar sort of one-dimensional um

Brett: you know very naive almost like reducing the woman to

Brett: a child um you know in a sense

Brett: um was being done here again 60s

Brett: and 70s male directors patriarchal societies i'm not

Brett: exactly sure what to make of it but there is a sense in

Brett: which i'm not i don't feel like tarkovsky at

Brett: least in the films i've seen maybe i could be wrong i've certainly haven't seen his

Brett: entire catalog but that that women don't

Brett: really play incredibly strong or or

Brett: dominant roles whatsoever um and

Brett: so that you know that's probably room for criticism there but

Brett: but yeah i don't know it's fascinating scene and it was it

Brett: was um i heard somebody describe it as that scene where they're kind of like

Brett: dancing in the woods like slow motion dancing they're twirling around each other

Brett: she's walking up the um you know the balance beam of the tree and walking back

Brett: down um hiding behind trees you know um it was a beautifully shot and sort of

Brett: choreographed a scene for sure.

Brett: But again, it's really hard to squeeze specific meaning out of it.

Evan: Yeah, I think that's I mean, yeah, none of I don't think anyone could accuse

Evan: Tarkovsky of any of the scenes not being, you know, shot and lit and all of

Evan: the things aspects of it.

Evan: But yeah, I think you're right though. I've seen one of the biggest criticisms is females.

Evan: There's never any female protagonists in any of his.

Evan: As far as I can think, at least not a lead protagonist. I mean,

Evan: there's some characters like in Solaris, the wife.

Evan: But another thing that's... Actually, Amanda, you brought this to my attention,

Evan: or you mentioned this to me, and I hadn't given it as much thought.

Evan: I think this goes back a little bit to the conversation comparing this to the

Evan: conflict in Palestine and Gaza.

Evan: We learn about the Soviet partisans, sort of this resistance movement that aids

Evan: the military and runs its own little operations.

Evan: And that's how Ivan becomes involved with the Soviet army.

Evan: It seems like he was working with them, one of these groups,

Evan: because he was angry that he had lost his entire family.

Evan: And there is some cooperation.

Evan: I'll be honest, I'm not deeply familiar with all

Evan: of the workings of how the collaboration went along

Evan: with the you know the rent army and uh these groups

Evan: but i do think uh what you said amanda is interesting about

Evan: how that group the partisans could be viewed

Evan: as this sort of resistance or revolutionary group and you know maybe from that

Evan: perspective ivan himself is sort of like a young revolutionary doing the things

Evan: he can do risking his life you know he doesn't seem afraid of death at this

Evan: you know at any moment in the movie uh maybe there's a couple scenes when he's having these kind of

Evan: nightmare dream sequences as he's waiting for, you know, to go out on his missions.

Evan: But I don't know how you make of those things.

Evan: And if either of you know more about the partisans, I'm curious how it might fit in.

amanda: I tried to do just some brief research on the partisans.

amanda: And I do have to note that one of the things that I noticed most,

amanda: especially researching online from the Imperial core is that there's always

amanda: this reoccurring narrative of like resistance groups being,

amanda: ragtag or useless or ineffective

amanda: um i forgot like what some of the highlights are but it does kind of remind

amanda: me of when you go look up the filipino like new people's army that's been around

amanda: for what 50 years now one of the first articles you'll see is like oh 48 years

amanda: of doing nothing thing or, you know, just kind of thing.

amanda: And, um, I think that, uh, I mean, that's intentional, of course,

amanda: you know, creating a narrative words are a minefield, but, um, I did. Yeah. Like, uh,

amanda: I would really like to do more research. I don't know, Brett,

amanda: if you know more about the partisans with your time with like guerrilla history.

amanda: I'm sure you probably have the episode, but yeah, that's just something I wanted to note.

Brett: Yeah, I'm not sure if we have ever done an episode on partisans in particular.

Brett: Certainly would be worth doing one. I have much to learn about the Soviet partisans

Brett: in particular, not super well read on exactly what they did.

Brett: But what I do know just from general understanding of history is that in the context of an invasion.

Brett: Partisans or the sort of civilian guerrilla fighters that work alongside or

Brett: in sort of a dialectical back and forth with conventional military strengths

Brett: are sort of like a natural emergence.

Brett: Emergence you can think of it in the bay of pigs situation you

Brett: can think of it in vietnam you can think of it in

Brett: the the spanish civil war wasn't necessarily

Brett: an invasion it was a civil war but you know left-wing areas being invaded by

Brett: right-wing forces and partisans were a natural emergence to that so you think

Brett: about it in the soviet context you have this expansionary nazi war machine coming

Brett: further and further east you know committing atrocities as it goes you know

Brett: Coming into your territory,

Brett: it's a natural response for people who are not part of the conventional military

Brett: to begin to just do their own operations, their own ambush attacks,

Brett: their own forms of resistance.

Brett: I mean, you can look in what was put up against the American invasion of Iraq

Brett: and Afghanistan, a very similar situation.

Brett: So I think in any context in which there is an invasion of a homeland by another

Brett: external force, there are going to be the emergence of these sort of naturally organized.

Brett: Um militant guerrilla warfare-esque groups

Brett: um who start to who begin to resist um and

Brett: you know that's uh that's clear now that the degree to

Brett: which they work with the conventional military um i

Brett: think that can probably differ depending on certain contexts

Brett: there could be probably more hostile relationships but for

Brett: what i understand about the soviet partisans there wasn't a hostile

Brett: relationship between them and the red army there was a funneling

Brett: of of intelligence of weapons etc and they

Brett: they saw the partisans as a crucial part of

Brett: the overall fighting force um so yeah i see the partisans

Brett: as as a good and really a natural force that

Brett: emerges in the face of invasion and you see it over and over shit even going

Brett: back you know to the american revolutionary war um you know you you didn't really

Brett: you have the development of something like a conventional military on behalf

Brett: of of the american colonists but you know guerrilla warfare tactics were definitely used and the sort

Brett: of ragtag guerrilla ambush groupings were a huge part of their initial assault against the British.

Brett: So yeah, any context of invasion, this sort of thing is going to emerge naturally.

Brett: And I think that's very interesting. And definitely we're studying more.

Brett: We should do an episode on that at some point.

Evan: The only thing I did find in my... Also, I didn't have a lot of...

Evan: I didn't get a chance to do much digging on it, but apparently a large amount

Evan: of the partisans that involved in Ukraine part of the Soviet Union were actually

Evan: formed through the interior ministry.

Evan: Of the Soviet Union.

Evan: So it wasn't necessarily just a bunch of, it could have been just some farmers

Evan: or random people banding together and going across enemy lines to kill Nazis or stop them.

Evan: But I think it also, there was aspects of it being,

Evan: an organized thing beyond just those kind of areas.

Evan: So to your point, Amanda, of, you know, yes, there probably was a combination

Evan: of sort of ragtag groups of people.

Evan: But then also, I think it became very organized at some level,

Evan: because it does seem in Ivan's childhood that there is some coordination because

Evan: they had a meeting point.

Evan: I think we mentioned another tree references that Ivan was supposed to meet

Evan: at a specific tree where he would then be able to be brought back to the partisans.

Evan: And I think we see that the partisans, was it the partisans

Evan: who are are hanged or is it the still soldiers i

Evan: don't remember now i'm not sure but either one of them it

Evan: clearly there there's this uh coordination so uh it

Evan: is a a fascinating thing that yeah i don't have too much

Evan: other context and i know at the beginning we talked about some of those real

Evan: life footage you mentioned amanda the uh you know using of actual footage from

Evan: you know victory day and you know the the way that the film is kind of shot

Evan: is it sort of kind of cuts off from the the actual incursion,

Evan: Ivan's last kind of mission that we see to victory day, a time of celebration.

Evan: But I think, uh, something that maybe is very well depicted in this is you have

Evan: that celebration and all these different shots of how it is, you know, great.

Evan: They defeated the Nazis, you know, that the Soviets defeated the Nazis.

Evan: Let's, let's be clear, uh, versus the, the American involvement.

Evan: Of course they had some involvement, but I don't need to go that far,

Evan: but I think it's, I really like how they created this, uh, they show the prison

Evan: that the lieutenant enters where he finds out that Ivan had died.

Evan: And you see a guillotine, you see the ropes for additional hanging.

Evan: So you do see victory, but you are very clearly shown the cost of war.

Evan: I don't remember the exact number, but something like 30 million Soviets died.

Evan: Maybe it's way more than that. Maybe I'm way underselling it.

Evan: But countless millions of men and women died to defend their country.

Evan: And I just like the way that it's depicted at the end, that there is no happy ending.

Evan: And then maybe after we get your impressions on that, I do want to talk about the very last scene too.

amanda: So towards the end of that, okay, first of all, war is a racket.

amanda: That's why I always think war is a racket. um and

amanda: there needs to be uh more

amanda: people talking about how the soviets did when you

amanda: know outside of our our bubble of people like

amanda: people that actually understand comprehend and care about history um but one

amanda: of the scenes that i aside from like the real footage of them like just defeating

amanda: the nazis taking over one of their headquarters is the scene where there's all

amanda: these like books and files like strewed all over the place. And they're,

amanda: you know, taking bundles,

amanda: And it pans out to this scene where there's kind of like on the left side of

amanda: the screen, I took a picture of it, but there's a left side of the screen.

amanda: There's like, I think maybe like an eagle holding the Nazi symbol.

amanda: And they say, and the dialogue just really stuck out to me. He said,

amanda: won't this be the last war on earth?

amanda: See a doctor about your nerves, Galston. That's like the young guy again.

amanda: But hold on, you were killed and I'm alive.

amanda: I think i must think

amanda: of persevering peace um and i think you know aside from the very last scene

amanda: that really encapsulates a lot of the theme of the film um and yeah i just wanted

amanda: to mention that i don't know where i was going with that but war's racket and.

Brett: Um building off of that uh One thing I was thinking about was this quote that's

Brett: been going around on right-wing social media circles, and Joe Rogan made a big deal about it.

Brett: It's this absurd sort of thing where they talk about hard times create hard

Brett: men, hard men create good times, good times create weak men,

Brett: weak men create bad times.

Brett: We're all aware of this sort of thing. and there's

Brett: this um one there's this irony that people like joe

Brett: rogan who you know live this incredibly comfy life

Brett: has been a millionaire since his early 20s um you

Brett: know has never faced any sort of violence of this type at all whatsoever um

Brett: puts himself mentally in the category of of of hard men right all these all

Brett: these conservative dorks um who who think in this way are are sort of immediately

Brett: assuming that they are the hard men even though they live these super coddled,

Brett: relatively comfortable lives.

Brett: And I saw one of these figures, I think it was Bronze Age Pervert,

Brett: one of these again, these fascist

Brett: sort of dorks that are very big and right-wing social media circles.

Brett: What they'll often do, and I think BAP did this explicitly, is just like sort of,

Brett: um fetishize war as like super

Brett: important for the develop like you know people who these all these

Brett: people have not never been to war but they precisely because

Brett: they haven't lived in war they fetishize it and romanticize it as a way of of

Brett: of you know adding dignity or maturity or meaning to people's lives and they

Brett: you know this is it's this in it's this um thing that you can't take out of

Brett: human nature it's deeply ingrained in human nature and it's we're alienated from

Brett: our ability to go ransack the

Brett: next village or, you know, go to war for a cause bigger than ourselves.

Brett: And these are always uttered by, by, you know, weak men,

Brett: men that, that live very comfortable coddled lives because other people before

Brett: them have fought and died and been traumatized and brutalized and created a

Brett: world, at least for a time where that they, they can be okay to fetishize war.

Brett: But anybody who's actually been in war, they're not romanticizing war.

Brett: They're not fetishizing it.

Brett: They're doing everything they can to never go back there.

Brett: And it also makes me think broadening out of our own disgusting bourgeois politicians

Brett: who are who've never seen a war they don't want.

Brett: I think of figures like Lindsey Graham, John Bolton, Nikki Haley,

Brett: fucking John Fetterman.

Brett: Right. And you can go down. You can I can keep saying names for the next hour and a half.

Brett: We all know who these people are these people who themselves

Brett: are have never fought and would

Brett: never be asked to fight constantly beating

Brett: the drums of war wanting to create wars

Brett: bomb countries bomb iran give israel everything

Brett: they need use ukrainians as a proxy for your

Brett: fight against russia these people who just see human

Brett: lives as chess pieces they can move around aboard

Brett: board and who get some sort of psychological gratification from

Brett: beating their chest in this egoic way where you

Brett: know they think that they're these war hawks and these

Brett: these tough-nosed realists who live these lives of

Brett: complete luxury and comfort all of them millionaires all of them surrounded

Brett: by basically servants and staff doing you know their bidding they don't even

Brett: have to do their own grocery shopping and yet they're so willing you know just

Brett: frothing at the mouth Wanting to create war after war after war.

Brett: And all of these people are the weak men that that quote is getting at while

Brett: they think of themselves as tough men. And then you look or tough people in general.

Brett: And then you look at the actual depravity of war, who actually suffers.

Brett: I mean, just look what's happening right now with with Palestine,

Brett: mothers and families and grandmas and entire bloodlines being eradicated,

Brett: toddlers being sniped in the head,

Brett: you know, medical supplies being

Brett: so non-existent that you have to do deep surgeries without anesthetic,

Brett: starvation used as a as a as a weapon of war.

Brett: And all of these people have full bellies and they're uncomfortable,

Brett: air conditioned houses, fetishizing and romanticizing brutal wars that as they

Brett: speak are being brought down on the heads of innocent human beings.

Brett: And so I just wanted to point out that glaring hypocrisy and to sort of ponder

Brett: for a second the sadistic and absurdist psychology of people who think and fetishize like this.

Brett: And we as communists, as people on the radical left, we want to get we want

Brett: humanity to mature beyond class society and beyond war.

Brett: And I don't think you can ever mature beyond war without maturing beyond class society,

Brett: without those divisions amongst a people amongst the nation,

Brett: rich and poor, but also globally, those incredibly skewed dynamics of the incredibly

Brett: poor and the incredibly rich.

Brett: That entire system creates the context for more war.

Brett: And I think it's not a part of our human nature any more than any negative low

Brett: base element of our evolution is part of our nature.

Brett: Like chimpanzees often rape people or, you know, rape other chimps.

Brett: This is a part of our evolutionary history from lowly beasts, right?

Brett: Does that mean that it's some inexorable part of our human nature to always be like that?

Brett: Or can we use our reason and our capacity for deep reflection and moral development

Brett: to grow up beyond the need to act like that?

Brett: And so anybody that says that class hierarchies are natural to or are just inextricable

Brett: from our human nature or that war itself can never be transcended,

Brett: I'm always incredibly, incredibly suspicious of the sort of people who seem

Brett: committed and need that to be true.

Brett: I do believe in the capacity for human beings to evolve beyond these things.

Brett: And I think it's really our obligation as sentient, you know,

Brett: moral and rational beings and self-reflective beings in the cosmos to grow the fuck up beyond that.

Brett: And I hold out hope that one day humanity will.

Evan: Are you saying that these guys playing Call of Duty didn't make him into real

Evan: men that could withstand that?

Brett: Exactly.

Evan: That's honestly like...

Brett: Exactly. That's all it is for them.

Evan: Yeah, it's literally a game to them. And yeah, it's...

amanda: Not to bring up another movie, but to bring up another movie.

amanda: I don't know if either one... I know, Evan, you've seen... I don't know,

amanda: Brett, if you've seen Civil War, the A24 film that came out in the spring.

Brett: Oh, not yet. Not yet.

amanda: Um, there, there is kind of some parallels with that, with like the,

amanda: the warmonger from his high tower.

amanda: Um, and the final scene, I don't want to ruin it for you. See,

amanda: um, but, uh, maybe you should go watch that after this.

amanda: Um, but there are some parallels right there with that, with that point of, you know, reality.

amanda: Is portrayed in that in that film with nick offerman's character who plays the president of,

amanda: america um i think they i don't even know if they

amanda: call it the united states i think it's called america but uh yeah there's

amanda: there's some parallels there with like the man in the high

amanda: tower you know um the the soldier

amanda: that is so brainwashed into dehumanizing

amanda: other people that don't look like you that they sit in

amanda: a nice comfortable room and push the button

amanda: on the drones that kill entire families or people at weddings

amanda: and in shelters and but you know

amanda: that doesn't make strong strong men um you know men men out men women out in

amanda: the field doesn't make them strong just like it doesn't make a child strong

amanda: to get beat up by their parents it makes them traumatized it makes them angry

amanda: it It makes them resentful.

amanda: It makes them not the whole human beings that they could have been,

amanda: not to say that they won't ever have that potential, but it is definitely a

amanda: stunting of maturity in humans and individuals.

amanda: But yeah.

Brett: Well said.

Evan: Yeah, I think, I guess before we finish up,

Evan: I wanted to, since in the other episodes, it makes sense we talk

Evan: about the very last scene and i'm curious kind of

Evan: your maybe your impressions and i've seen some different things

Evan: written about it so the the final scene after we get the

Evan: victory day and we learn that ivan had been killed you know by the nazis uh

Evan: during the war we get a kind of a dream sequence or some kind of vision sequence

Evan: where you see ivan and his sister presumably playing sort of hide and seek on

Evan: a beach and it's you know very similar reminiscent of very opening scene,

Evan: kind of a very, you know, symmetrical opening and closing of the movie by Tarkovsky.

Evan: But the thing about it is that Ivan at this point is dead. So I'm curious,

Evan: this is maybe kind of a pointless exercise in like what your theory or how you would look at it is.

Evan: Obviously, it can't be from his perspective as a dream sequence because he's now dead.

Evan: But some things I've seen say, you know, maybe it's more of a perspective of

Evan: the sister or the mother, or Or this is the vision of what the lieutenant would have wanted,

Evan: you know, Ivan to have been able to achieve, you know, had he not had to have

Evan: been involved in the war, had there been no war.

Evan: So it is this sort of idyllic ending to it.

Evan: And I think it's a better ending than having it kind of be that,

Evan: you know, slightly darker, depressing, you know, the seeing all the horrors

Evan: that the Nazis have for have, you know, have have committed.

Evan: So, yeah, I wonder what you all think of the last the last scene.

Brett: I mean, you know, there's no way to know for sure, but I kind of think of it

Brett: not from a specific person's point of view, but from a universal sort of zoomed

Brett: out perspective, Like a sort of non-individual perspective,

Brett: a perspective of humanity itself, of just sort of reflecting on the fundamental

Brett: innocence and the childhood that could have been, should have been,

Brett: would have been, if not for the horrors of war.

Brett: And um it's just sort of a sort of

Brett: sad uh nostalgic almost uh you

Brett: know what if in a sense and no and no single

Brett: individual is dreaming that or thinking that it's just

Brett: like zoomed out like the the eye in the

Brett: sky is thinking it or reflecting on that maybe but one thing it it harkens back

Brett: to is that that earlier quote that i that i read from james baldwin about all

Brett: the children are ours and the moral responsibility and obligation that that

Brett: imposes on all of us who are not children, who are adults.

Brett: And some of us have children, some of us don't have children,

Brett: some want children, some don't want children.

Brett: But I think we should always be suspicious of anybody who is disdainful of children as such,

Brett: whether that is the explicit overt form of supporting wars or fetishizing,

Brett: romanticizing wars or funding and arming you

Brett: know groups of people who are specifically going after

Brett: children as the u.s is is doing right now or

Brett: even in the in the more low level ways where people just sort of have this disdain

Brett: for children this sort of like you know like oh my god they're you know that

Brett: term from like 10 years ago like crotch goblins or you know um i i would never

Brett: i could never imagine myself having kids they're just annoying little you know

Brett: shitty messes or whatever Reverend.

Brett: Whether you have kids or not, it's a totally valid personal choice,

Brett: but I would urge everybody,

Brett: no matter if you have any kids in your life or no kids in your life,

Brett: to try to take seriously this Baldwin idea that all the children are ours and

Brett: that just by virtue of being a human adult,

Brett: you have an obligation and responsibility to try to create a world in which

Brett: children aren't brutalized.

Brett: And that starts with having a love for children is sort of being synonymous

Brett: with a love for our humanity because we were all children once.

Brett: And there's that fundamental, beautiful possibility and hope that is,

Brett: you know, present in every child because they represent the future.

Brett: There's this fundamental innocence, this best of our nature,

Brett: this open-eyed curiosity about the world around them before it's sort of been

Brett: beaten out of them or drowned out by concepts, etc.

Brett: That we We should all have this obligation and think of all the children as

Brett: ours and to have this loving, nurturing feeling towards children and wanting

Brett: to create a better world, not just for ourselves and not even just for our own children,

Brett: but for children as a whole, for humanity's children.

Brett: And I really take that responsibility seriously as a father to my own children,

Brett: but as a human being to try to fight for a world in which all children are safe

Brett: and all children get a childhood.

Brett: And when you see these incidences of war, when you see what's happening in Palestine,

Brett: because that's the most concrete example currently happening,

Brett: all the children in Gaza and in Palestine are being robbed of a childhood.

Brett: They're being brutalized for this 75-plus-year-old European nationalist colonizing project.

Brett: You're destroying babies and lives and futures for entire family lines and lineages

Brett: because of some concepts you have in your head about God's chosen people and

Brett: whose land this really is, etc.

Brett: Etc and um it is so it is

Brett: so absurd and so immature it's like there's almost like it's

Brett: there's a a deeper level of immaturity on

Brett: behalf of people who think like that and who can do that than children themselves

Brett: right we see children as underdeveloped or immature but in some deep sense you

Brett: know the the real immaturity and the underdevelopment come from the adults who

Brett: brutalize them whether that is interpersonal abuse or wartime destruction or anything else,

Brett: and so yeah I just want to like one of my last notes,

Brett: is for everybody to take seriously that Baldwin quote and to think about creating

Brett: a better world where that obligation to humanity's children is taken seriously

Brett: on the individual and collective level.

amanda: Absolutely. Another thing that I think about that we also have to understand

amanda: that it's not normal for people to have to hold up their dead children to get people to care.

amanda: Um like uh i

amanda: personally do not have children but i weep daily

amanda: for the children that i see every single

amanda: day that are brutalized and additionally

amanda: those that do survive that do manage to

amanda: have their limbs you are going to have

amanda: resistance for future generations and no one can be surprised by that no one

amanda: could be surprised that when a child sees their entire family taken out and

amanda: their livelihood jeopardized at every moment that they're going to sit idly

amanda: by when they become old enough to do something.

amanda: But as far as the closing scene, I think that also it goes to your quote, Brett,

amanda: that you talked about symbolism and metaphor

amanda: and how with the image you could take

amanda: many things from that image and

amanda: with that final scene um it could

amanda: be what the viewer hopes the turn

amanda: the outcome is for ivan that maybe he goes to

amanda: heaven and he gets to be or whatever you know rendition of something like that

amanda: like an afterlife or whatever um that he gets to be reunited with with those

amanda: those memories and those peoples

amanda: and whatnot or it It could be what the soldiers would want for Ivan,

amanda: or it could be maybe even flashback, you know, to even before he was dead.

amanda: Not to override exactly like the importance that the children of the world are

amanda: ours and what you were speaking of.

amanda: They are ours, every single one of them.

Evan: Yeah, no, that was beautifully said, Brett. I don't pretend to top or not top,

Evan: but I don't have much to add there except, you know, as someone,

Evan: you know, with children too.

Evan: And wanting to protect them and the same way you want to protect the innocence

Evan: of or the same way that the you know the soldiers wanted to protect the innocence

Evan: of Ivan you want a better world for your children and all children so they don't

Evan: have to one day realize the horrors that,

Evan: We unfortunately have to see on a daily basis on, you know, on social media,

Evan: not on the news, because they would not like us to see those horrors.

Evan: But I don't think I had any, I don't know.

amanda: Unless they're, unless they're Russians or something.

Evan: Yes, yeah, that's true. Unless it fits a narrow, I was gonna say a NATO narrative.

Evan: That's not what I even meant. That was just a Freudian slip.

Evan: A narrative for NATO, I suppose. So I don't know if either of you have any last

Evan: thoughts on it, and if not, I guess we can call it.

Evan: And I know, at least from your perspective, Brett, I think people know where to find you.

Evan: But if you want to remind everyone your shows and if you have anything in particular

Evan: you're going to be working on or anything like that you wanted to share.

Brett: Yeah, first of all, thank you so much for having me on. I really love this series.

Brett: Maybe we can keep it going. This is our third film.

Brett: So if you're just listening to this, go back, you know, both of our podcasts,

Brett: Left of the Projector or Rev Left Radio, and you'll find our other two episodes on Stalker and Solaris.

Brett: Highly encourage people who are just interested in film or interested in history

Brett: to check out the films of Tarkovsky. I mean, you know, one of the greatest to ever do it.

Brett: So highly recommend people check that out. And then as for me and my work,

Brett: I have two sort of fronts that I operate on.

Brett: One is the political front, and you can find everything I do there at RevolutionaryLeftRadio.com.

Brett: That's my main podcast, Rev Left Radio, and the sister podcast,

Brett: Red Menace, I do with my co-host and friend, Allison.

Brett: And then I recently in the last year or so have started a totally separate podcast

Brett: called Shoeless in South Dakota, where me and my childhood friend who is an

Brett: active recovery from alcoholism, we joke around,

Brett: but we also talk deeply about mental health issues, addiction, recovery,

Brett: relapse, and all spirituality,

Brett: all of the things in that whole realm together.

Brett: Human experience. So it's not very political, but it does cover that other aspect of human life.

Brett: So if you're kind of interested in that, you can check out shoelessandsouthdakota.com.

Evan: Awesome. And I guess, Amanda, for you, I can post your link to your social media,

Evan: content as well as your, you also have shirts as well. I guess not only shirts.

amanda: Yeah, I make communist propaganda on Etsy.

Evan: Yes yes um but yeah amanda and

Evan: brett as always it's a pleasure to have you uh on to talk

Evan: more tarkovsky um you know these have been it's

Evan: been a whole lot of fun to uh to get into movies that like

Evan: these i think for anyone out there who you know maybe isn't used

Evan: to watching you know these kind of things i think brett you mentioned and

Evan: maybe the first one you did on uh so are as you know when

Evan: you watch a movie like this it's it would benefit you

Evan: greatly to just stick your phone in the other room i

Evan: know it's hard and you're used to having your phone when

Evan: you're doing things but i think you get a lot out of these kinds of

Evan: films when you just kind of focus on things and you see the nature and the trees

Evan: and everything that tarkovsky brings to it you know not just you know his film

Evan: there's lots of other soviet movies and uh other eras too and just for anyone

Evan: out there this is not coming for a couple months but i'll be doing an episode with the actual,

Evan: existing socialism on East German cinema

Evan: in a few months so anyone out there would recommend watching those kind of movies

Evan: too there's lots out there if you have access to your library you should connect

Evan: it to Canopy if they have access and you likely will find lots of great foreign

Evan: films available to you or you could just go on YouTube but Brett, Amanda,

Evan: thanks again for being on the show it's been a pleasure yeah.

amanda: Thank you and also also long live the resistance.

Evan: Yes and uh you can follow this podcast on the internets and uh all the same

Evan: places as uh as brett's content and the at sea store so we will catch you next time.