| A Sixth Part of the World | |
|---|---|
_poster.jpg) | |
| Directed by | Dziga Vertov |
| Written by | Dziga Vertov |
| Produced by | Kultkino,Sovkino |
| Cinematography | Mikhail Kaufman |
| Edited by | Elizaveta Svilova, Dziga Vertov |
| Distributed by | Sovkino |
Release date |
|
Running time | 73 minutes |
| Country | Soviet Union |
| Languages | Silent film Russian intertitles |
| Budget | SUR 80 000 |
A Sixth Part of the World (Russian:«Шестая часть мира»,romanized: Shestaya Chast Mira) is a 1926silent film directed byDziga Vertov and produced by Kultkino (part ofSovkino). Through thetravelogue format, it depicted the multitude of Soviet peoples in remote areas ofUSSR and detailed the entirety of the wealth of the Soviet land. Focusing on cultural and economic diversity, the film is in fact a call for unification in order to build a "complete socialist society".
A mix betweennewsreel andfound footage, Vertov edited sequences filmed by eight teams ofkinoks (kinoki) during their trips. According to Vertov, the film anticipates the coming of sound films by using a constant "word-radio-theme" in the intertitles.[2] Thanks toA Sixth Part of the World and his following featureThe Eleventh Year (1928), Vertov matures his style in which he will excel in his most famous filmMan with a Movie Camera (1929).
Vertov starts by showing us, with intertitles in giantCyrillic characters, what he sees (Вижу) about the capitalist West with itsfoxtrot andblack minstrels, and then switches his attention to the audience (Вы) and then the individual viewer (Ты). In one self-reflective moment, Vertov even shows cinema-goers watching an earlier piece of the film (‘And you sitting in the audience’).
He takes the viewer on a tour of the vital importance of agricultural production, which generates export revenue (shot of the ship’s nameplateGreenwich) so that Russia can buy machines to build more machines (shots of amilling machine). This gives him the pretext to take aCook’s tour of the extremities of the Soviet Union, showing theLenin (shot downwards from above the prow) delivering new dogs to theSamoyeds onNovaya Zemlya and their being invited on board to listen to agramophone recording ofVladimir Lenin himself. Then the film showsBukhara where one of themosques is looking very dingy and crumbled, and toLeningrad where trams run down the middle of broad empty boulevard as a horse-drawn carriage turns out. Next are shown aKirghiz with a giant eagle perched on his arm, a bear encircled by yapping dogs, afox caught in a trap and another one that is a child’s pet,guillemots, gulls, a man shooting asable in the top of a pine tree, apine marten,sheep being dragged into the sea for a wash and other sheep being obliged to jump into a stream for the same purpose - the intertitles are surreal: 'You – whether you are washing your sheep in the sea (film) or whether you are washing your sheep in the river (film)...' Then trappers are shown bringing their furs to the Госторг (Gostorg) trading post in exchange for manufactured goods, everyone contributing to the national economy. The furs are destined for theLeipzig fair (ярмарка). In astop-frame sequence, rows oforanges align themselves in a packing box, wadges of packing material shuffle along and jump on top of them, and then the lids close (the line pulling one of the sides is just visible). Coke is shown being quenched, as well as electricity pylons and insulators, and the village electricity co-op.Sturgeon are lifted out of tanks to makecaviar. Next are shown barrels of butter – 'it is yours!'Wheat is threshed, linen is spun and cotton is ginned. The country is being modernised, although there are still some people who trust inMohammed (film) orChrist (a man telling his rosary) orBuddha (film) and there is a Siberianshaman looking remarkably like a North American Indian, and even areindeer being slaughtered (by axe blows to the neck) as a sacrifice. The film shows crowds of women in full-face veils, but also a modernising country as a woman lifts her veil. Then there are sometundra-dwellers eating raw reindeer meat.
It is a travelogue and anthropological document.Lenin’s Mausoleum is his alone at this time (1926). The moral: everyone produces and is buildingsocialism. It starts with slavery and ends with developing countries joining the socialist revolution.
In an interview forKino magazine in August 1926, Vertov explained his intentions: "A Sixth Part of the World is more than a film, than what we have got used to understanding by the word ‘film’. Whether it is a newsreel, a comedy, an artistic hit-film,A Sixth Part of the World is somewhere beyond the boundaries of these definitions; it is already the next stage after the concept of ‘cinema’ itself... Our slogan is: 'All citizens of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics from 10 to 100 years old must see this work. By the tenth anniversary of October there must not be a single Tungus who has not seenA Sixth Part of the World” (quoted in Barbara Wurm's essay in the DVD booklet).[3]
At the beginning of 1918, Dziga Vertov was hired to edit the newsreelKinonedelia ("Cineweek") for the Moscow Cinema Committee. With no formal education in the science of editing, he learnt to build a coherent newsreel with a minimum of stock. Practising editing on different kinds of short movies, Vertov began to theorize his own view on editing. In the hope of putting his theories into practice, in 1922 he formed the first group ofkinoki ("cine-eyes") in which he began to issue theKinopravda ("Cine-truth") serie of films. At that time, Vertov published essays in specialized publications detailing his theories on cinema. In 1924, the Goskino film production company set up a documentary section called Kultkino and Vertov was placed in charge. That year, Goskino was replaced by Sovkino, which continue to operate the Kultkino section. In 1925, Gostorg, the Central State Trading Organisation, was seeking a director for a film promoting internal trade and praising the merits of the new social order.A Sixth Part of the World was produced by Kultkino withinSovkino.[4]
The film was well received byPravda. Praising the film, the periodicalSovetskii Ekran ("Soviet Screen") stated: "These films reveal to us that Russian cinematography has found the correct path".[5] However, prominent critics criticized it. Critic Viktor Shklovsky accused the film of being fiction in his article "The Cine-Eyes and Intertitles". According to criticIppolit Sokolov, the movie is a "deformation of facts done by montage". The film remained mostly unexploited by official propaganda and Vertov was expelled fromSovkino production in 1927, being accused of exceeding more than three times the initial budget of 40,000 roubles (the film actually cost twice this budget).[6]
Editions Filmmuseum released the film in 2009 in a 2-disc set with the filmThe Eleventh Year (1928). Both films have accompanying compositions byMichael Nyman.[7]
In 2015, the Belgian post-rock bandWe Stood Like Kings, specialized in writing new soundtracks for silent movies, released its own new live score USSR 1926 for the film on the German label Kapitän Platte.[8]
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