04. The Montage in Battleship Potemkin (1925)
By todays standards it may not appear that imaginative, but back in the mid-20s
Sergei Eisensteins Battleship Potemkin montage scene was radically inventive. Credited with inventing the montage, Eisenhower uses this technique to incredible effect here. Managing to use the editing effect to display a range of emotions within characters, the montage in Potemkin is quite frankly revolutionary. The technique has of course gone on to become a staple within film, to a point that it is often over or even mis used on a regular basis. The heavily montage laden films of the 80s have often been mocked and generally degrade the technique considerably. But here it generates expression in a way that silent cinema had not previously achieved. Rather than relying on facial expression alone, the constant cuts between images help generate a story that has no need for title cards to be spliced in between. This one series of shots changed the face of cinema forever! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=euG1y0KtP_Q