When Dwight Macdonald (a brilliant, iconoclastic film critic for decades, for Esquire, Paris Review, the New Yorker, and other magazines) taught a film course at the University of Wisconsin in the '70s, this was one of only about 15 films in his course. (Others included Rules of the Game, Children of Paradise, Keaton's Cops, and Seven Samurai, to give you an idea of the range and level of films he chose.) This film has stayed with me-- in a way, it has haunted me-- for thirty years, since I first saw it back then. I only recently rented it from Netflix and discovered, all over again, the mature and sophisticated style of early Russian filmmakers, and the power they could generate, particularly with material as touching and honest as Gorky's autobiography. Even minor characters, like the crippled boy who keeps insects as pets (metaphor alert--this movie is about serfs), dreaming he can some day set them free in the fields around the Volga, are utterly believable. It really is a must for every serious film-goer.
Review of Gorky 1: The Childhood of Maxim Gorky
