Esfir Ilyinichna Shub (Russian: Эсфи́рь Ильи́нична Шуб; 16 March 1894, Surazh, Russian Empire – 21 September 1959, Moscow, Soviet Union), also referred to as Esther Il'inichna Shub, was a pioneering Soviet filmmaker and editor in both the mainstream and documentary fields.[1] She is best known for her trilogy of films,Fall of the Romanov Dynasty (1927),The Great Road (1927), andThe Russia of Nicholas II and Leo Tolstoy (1928).[2] Shub is credited as the creator ofcompilation film[3] and is known for her revolutionary approaches to editing and assembling preserved and archived footage.
Shub was born, March 16, 1894, into a Jewish family of landowners in the town of Surazhe, a small town in theChernigov region ofUkraine, which is now the Brianskaya province of the southwest part of theRussian Federation. Her father, Ilya Roshal, was a pharmacist. Shub’s mother died when she was a young child and was also known to have one brother. Shub was born into a lower middle class family,[4] and travelled toMoscow before theRussian Revolution.[5]
By the mid-1910s, Shub had settled in Moscow to begin her study of literature at the Institute for Women’s Higher Education.[4] There she got involved in the revolutionary fervor emerging amongst young university students.[6]
After moving to Moscow, Shub became involved in the Soviet avant-garde world, specifically inconstructivist theatre. Shub edited a wide range of films. Noted is her first work, a complete re-editing ofCharlie Chaplin's 1916 filmCarmen, which was the first Chaplin film ever to be seen in theSoviet Union.[7] In 1918, after working asVsevolod Meyerhold’s private secretary in the Soviet administration at the head office of the TEO Theatre Department of the Narkompros (People’s Commissariat of Education), she began collaborating with the stage directorVsevolod Meyerhold and poetVladimir Mayakovsky on several theatrical projects. During this time she also became involved with theLeft Front of the Arts (LEF) group.[8]
In 1922, Shub began her film career atGoskino, the major Soviet state-owned film company. There she worked as an editor, in charge of censoring imported foreign films for domestic distribution, rendering these films “suitable” for Soviet audiences.[6] Here she worked alongsideSergei Eisenstein, re-editing films such as the Soviet release ofFritz Lang’sDr Mabuse.
Shub’s intensive experience atGoskino, reediting pre-revolutionary and foreign productions as well as new Soviet features, helped cultivate the journalistic style of filmmaking she is well-regarded for. Her method of editing had a substantial influence on bothDziga Vertov and Eisenstein, two of her most prominent peers.[9]
In 1927, Shub released her first documentary,Padenie dinastii Romanovykh. She was commissioned to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the October Revolution.[10] and to provide the first visual record of theRussian Revolution.The Fall of the Romanov Dynasty is one of Shub’s most famous surviving films and what many film historians classify as the first compilation film orSoviet montage. Originally titledFebruary, screenwriter Mark Tseitlin and Esfir Shub collaborated on this documentary-style film centered around the decline of the Russian monarchy.[11]
The movie is made up of stock and archived footage that Shub meticulously preserved and reused. Shub traveled to Leningrad in 1926 to obtain the footage she needed for the film, spending two months examining more than 60,000 meters of film (much of which was damaged) and chose 5,200 meters to take back to Moscow.[12] The film covers the years 1912 to 1917, recounting the moments before, after and during World War I, and then ending with theOctober Revolution. It is notable for its use of intertitles, which provide historical context and commentary on the events depicted in the footage as well as help guide viewers through the beginning of the end of the Romanov dynasty. This technique, along with her portrayal of the Romanov family, effectively demonstrates the stark contrast between the lavish lifestyle of the aristocracy and the struggles of the working class. Film theorist Alla Gadassik suggests that without her intervention in "sourcing, untangling and preserving neglected rolls of film, it is highly likely that none of this footage would survive the following decades."[11] Shub’s contribution to the history of compilation film was influential in the United States in the 1930s and during World War II. Historians Jack C. Ellis and Betsy A. McLane note that, “nothing like Shub’s films had existed before them, and her work remains among the finest examples of the compilation technique."[13]
Eisenstein'sOctober(1928), which was also commissioned for the tenth anniversary of the event, was criticized by LEFists (Soviet art journalists), for being 'too personal,' while deeming the impersonality of Shub's work more exemplary for the Revolution. Soviet film theorists praised Shub’s invisible authority as truly revolutionary, for it was consumed effectively as propaganda.Sergei Emolinsky, a constructivist critic associated with Soviet art journal, LEF, praises both Shub and Vertov equally for their different attitudes towards documentary film. He explains that while, “Vertov ‘threw himself on the given material, cutting it into numerous pieces, thus subordinating it to his imagination...Shub regarded each piece [shot] as to a self-sufficient, autonomous entity’.” This first-hand critique of the two methods indicate that Shub’s dedication to journalistic cinematography was the catalyst for what documentary film classifies today, compilation film.[14]
In 1927 Shub published the article "Rabota Montazhnits" or "The Work of Montagesses," which outlined the labour of women in editing.[11] This article was published months following the distribution of theFall of the Romanov Dynasty (1927) documentary, which is when Shub was struggling to gain recognition and directional credit for her film.
In 1932, Shub helped spearhead the first Soviet documentary to have sound, calledSponsor of Electrification.[7]
In the late 1940s and early 1950s, she worked predominantly as an editor and spent time writing her memoirs both about her life and about filmmaking techniques. She also wrote a script titledWomen (1933–34), which examined women's roles throughout history. Although this project was never filmed, the script reveals Shub's interest in feminism.[7]
Shub was married twice. She had a daughter, Anna, with her first husband, Isaac Vladimirovich Shub. After this marriage ended in divorce, she marriedAleksei Gan, a filmmaker who also published the film journalKino-Fot. Shub died on September 21, 1959, in Moscow.[7]
Esfir Shub took the time to write her own memoirs entitled,Zhizn Moya — Kinematograf (My Life — Cinema) in the latter half of her career. More information about these memoirs can be found in Vlada Petric’s article in theQuarterly Review of Film Studies no. 4, “Esther Shub: Cinema is My Life” which is available for viewing at the New York Public Library.[14] In her memoirs, she describes numerous films that were either never made or that the government handed to lesser-known filmmakers who were favored at the time.[6] In her recollections, she is forthcoming about her struggle to win respect as a female theorist and practitioner in the male dominated field of Soviet cinema.[5]
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