Concerning his artistic intentions on these matters, Tarkovsky was explicit :Īs already mentioned, the Russian writer Andrei Gorchakov (played by Oleg Yankovsky – he played the father of the main character in Tarkovsky’s The Mirror) has come to Italy to write about an 18th century Russian composer, Pavel Sasnovsky, who lived in Italy for a few years before returning to Russia (where he committed suicide). I have earlier discussed how alienation has been a particularly important characterological theme in film, notably in the works of Michelangelo Antonioni, and we can say that Nostalghia is yet another work that adds to this aesthetic collection. Alienation emerged as a major cultural theme, and a key notional element of Existentialism, in the twentieth century, and it has represented the quizzical sense of absence and frustration for some people that has come along with modernity. But more generally, Gorchakov feels alienation, and that is the primary theme of this film. While in Italy, Gorchakov feels ‘nostalghia’ – a custom term for the special longing Russians feel for their homeland when they are away. It concerns the activities of a Russian poet and writer, Andrei Gorchakov, who has come to Italy to do research for a book he intends to write on the experiences of an 18th century Russian composer who lived in Italy for a few years. Nevertheless, there is something of a story to Nostalghia. In this connection, Tarkovsky once commented that his aesthetic intentions for cinema lay in an off-the-beaten-track direction :Īnd presumably Nostalghia is an instantiation of these anti-narrative inclinations of Tarkovsky’s. Both of these films abandon conventional plot structures entirely and seek to conjure up a state of mind. I have discussed Tarkovsky’s aesthetics in connection with his earlier films – Ivan's Childhood (1962), Andrei Rublev (1966), Solaris (1972), The Mirror (1975), and Stalker (1979) – and we could probably say of these, the film most directly comparable to Nostalghia is his most inward and personal work, The Mirror. One of the most extreme examples of this tendency was his penultimate film, Nostalghia (1983). Increasingly, his films became more and more attempts to directly represent his own personal feelings, with minimal reference to schematic models or thoughts. In particular, Tarkovsky was progressively more sensitive to the possibilities of cinematic expression transcending the limits of textual expression and directly invoking the wider range and complexity of human consciousness. Working in Russia under restrictive conditions, he was only able to make seven feature films over his last twenty-four years, but each was a fascinating and challenging work of cinematic expression. Andrei Tarkovsky (1932-1986) was a gifted filmmaker noted for his uniquely expressive style.
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