I previously wrote about how Andrei Tarkovsky’s “Mirror” is a example ripe for studying audience response to film, because it is so explicitly about the audience. It is called “Mirror,” and in turn is intended to reflect the viewer’s life back at him. However, Tarkovsky’s ability to inspire a multitude of responses extends beyond “Mirror,” because it is something inherent to his cinematic style; his goal is to capture something real, some “actual fact,” across cinematic time, and to do this many (or most) narrative elements in his films remain without comment, starkly contrasting with the consistent hand-holding natural to, and even expected of, modern Hollywood filmmakers. As such, I would like to use my own response to the film, across the three times and four years that I have seen it, to demonstrate this principle, and how a film can morph and change in the mind of the audience, while still remaining solid, unchanging, and true itself.
November 2021
“No single individual can have enough hatred or love to spread over all mankind,” says the Writer as he constructs his own personal Crown of Thorns, mocking the symbol which itself was originally intended to mock the very individual the Writer is forgetting.
“When a man is born, he is soft and pliable. When he dies, he is strong and hard. When a tree grows, it is soft and pliable. But when it’s dry and hard, it dies,” says the Stalker. I think of Jadis in the Magician’s Nephew, about whom Aslan says: “Length of days with an evil heart is only length of misery and already she begins to know it. All get what they want; they do not always like it.” And in the Problem of Pain, Lewis nearly repeats himself: “I willingly believe that the damned are, in one sense, successful, rebels to the end; that the doors of hell are locked on the inside.”
That’s the scariest thing about STALKER. The Room is not a wishing room, it’s a test of your very soul. So when the camera, when you, are sitting inside the Room, it doesn’t matter what your conscious desires are, it matters who you really are. So no matter how much I tell myself that I don’t want to be a Rebel, there’s that seed of doubt that says deep down I still am. The Writer himself says, “A man writes because he is tormented, because he doubts… And if I know for sure that I’m a genius? Why write then?” Which kind of tells me that this Doubt is necessary in order to leave the Rebellion, to give up self-interest and accept the man whose love was, in fact, spread over all mankind.
And I think you find that hope in the final scene with the daughter moving the cups. The scene is rather confounding, but my first instinct is to put it in the context of Matthew 17: “If you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move.” Which makes sense in juxtaposition with the themes of doubt.
All very scattered thoughts and preliminary reactions, but STALKER, just like MIRROR, left me in such a self reflective state, because of both Tarkovsky’s beautiful poetic images and profound depth of ideas. And again, it’s just scratching the surface but both films made me want to curl up in a ball and cry, more so than anything because of how much I DIDN’T understand them. It’s a film to digest over a lifetime.
June 2022
I always feel like I have to physically lie down after watching one of Andrei Tarkovsky’s movies.
The experience is like swimming to the bottom of the ocean and feeling the weight of the water above you. With Stalker I feel the pull to swim deeper and as I do it feels actually dangerous. I know this might seem pretentious but watching Stalker is unlike most movies in that it feels like you are going on an actual adventure, that you are in just as much if not more danger than the characters that are captured on film. It is one of the most wholly REAL things I have experienced outside of REAL life.
Part of this is just the way Tarkovsky captures the scenario and environment. We are present for every single step taken by the protagonists, walking alongside them. And the content of the shots frequently brings me to tears… “Monkey” riding on her father’s shoulders is one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen.
Previously a lot of what I noted aligned with the Writer’s sentiments. I feared (fear?) what my heart is truly aligned with, and that this is what makes the Room a terrifying thing. What I did not note is that the Writer uses this as an excuse to reject the hope offered by the Room, and the subsequent despair that this causes the Stalker. I felt the supernatural nature of the Zone along with the Stalker, in a very literal sense, so I became more skeptical about the Writer’s skepticism. It felt like—and I don’t think this is an exaggeration—having God’s hand on my shoulder.
I love how the final scene brings so many pieces into place—“Burning embers of desire” in the final poem reflects back to/connects the Professor’s fire and the nature of the room; the shaking of the table and moving of the glass recalls one of the opening shots of the bedside table shaking from the train, which I think asks the question if this movement can be rationally explained; and then Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy” competes with the rattling train, finalizing the Stalker’s statement about how music, without words or tangible connection to our reality, can and will touch our souls. But this is merely putting into words what can only be felt by watching the film, just how describing “Ode to Joy” to someone who’s never heard it doesn’t do anybody any good.
I said this at the end of my last watch, and I think I will end up saying it again: This is a film to digest over a lifetime.
July 2024
“You certainly are lucky. Now you’ll live to be a hundred!”
“Why not forever?”
Stalker remains a great weight but, as all great movies must, has morphed and changed to be so in a different way. I wanted to watch it again tonight for technical reasons, as prep for a shoot I have tomorrow, so I felt a bit caught between analyzing + assessing it and allowing it to work emotionally. In turn, it was not as physically visceral as I remember it being last time I watched it, yet it still retains all of its heaviness. I noticed how much its power comes from holding you in place for extended periods of time by simply not moving the camera – pans are incredibly rare, and most camera moves are slow dolly ins and outs. The trademark “Tarkovsky floating” actually needs to be imperceptible in order to work, and this also reveals that he is one of the best in history at utilizing motion on the Z-axis. Maybe throw Wes Anderson in there as an honorable mention. Additionally, because the camera is so static, there are times when action will happen off screen that we only hear in sound effects, which is equally rattling – so much of what makes it frightening is the implication of traps and monsters, and then subsequently the cumulative weight of the journey. (Another thing worth noting is the sheer percentage of runtime that I can recall instantly. Part of that is the long average shot length, but there is hardly an image that isn’t cemented in memory.)
Thematically, I never really focused before on how much Stalker calls himself a “louse” and how low he truly is – he cannot do the task without giving up everything. His wife says early on “fine, don’t care about your own self, but at least try and take care of us.” His role requires complete and utter sacrifice. I read something earlier today about how Dostoevsky went through so much misery (death of a child, gulag, gambling) and this is the reason why he could see life so clearly, why his perception of reality was so truthful. Stalker can’t understand why Professor and Writer don’t want happiness, but in the end it’s because they’re elites, it’s because they don’t suffer, because they’re aware how strong their material desires are. Stalker can only see worth in the Zone because he doesn’t have anything else, because he is able to overlook and deny materialism. It’s hard to stress how radical this is in the film landscape – and how biblical it is.
“Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.” Luke 15:7
“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” Matthew 5:3
“For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.” Luke 19:10
“Whoever seeks to preserve his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life will keep it.” Luke 17:33
“But where sin increased, grace abounded all the more, so that, as sin reigned in death, grace also might reign through righteousness leading to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” Romans 5:20-21
Etc etc etc.
“So it lets the good ones pass and kills the bad ones?” Writer says about the Zone, to which Stalker responds, “I don’t know. I think it lets those pass who have lost all hope. Not good or bad, but wretched people.” I think we generally like to think that good people are the ones we prop up – our humanism says that if you’re poor you are good, if you have the right worldview and politics you are good, if you do the right things you are good. But “None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.” Romans 3:10-12. This also stands in contradiction to modern self-help theology: “Sin” is not just the bad things you do, the tiny infractions against the law – “sin” is who you are down to your core, utter wretchedness, and thus only those who are wretched enough to see it can be saved from it.
The only thing I can do is pray that my heart will continue to change, that I can believe in my own wretchedness, and that my desires will be further turned to the good.
Looking back on these responses, I find it funny that I was self-aware enough in the moment to point out, each time, that I was going to do what I am doing now – digesting it across a lifetime and finding something new out of it each time. In a great film such as Stalker, it is not so much that the audience member is misreading it the first time and then correctly reading it the second time, but instead reading one surface of it the first time, and then finding another surface the second, and hopefully, by the third, fourth, fifth, and continual viewings, digging under the surface and into the infinite which the film has to offer. Again, this is not possible with every film. Most films are built to be read “correctly”, in which case it is true that the only thing a second viewing would be good for is a correcting of an incorrect misunderstanding, or otherwise for a pleasant, relaxing, and familiar noise. (An essay could be written on the returning to these types of film and how it is similar to the ritual of television.) Through the lens of a response across time, Stalker is clearly a different beast, the type of film that, as should be the case more often, is an infinite ocean to swim in.