Reviews of silent film releases on home video. Copyright © 1999-2024 by Carl Bennett and the Silent Era Company. All Rights Reserved.

Strike (1924)

Sergei Eisenstein’s first feature-length film is a bold cinematic statement that is, in some aspects, more experimental and visually striking than his later works.

While the film is serious in subject matter, there are wonderfully broad comical elements of characterization and performance in the portrayals of the factory managers, the capitalists and their spies in the first of the five sections of the film.

The film takes a serious turn in the second part when a worker commits suicide on the factory floor, and the other workers initiate a spontaneous strike.

The film is entertaining on multiple levels with its touches of comedy, its pathos laden drama, and its intriguing visual inventiveness.

This Blu-ray Disc edition has been transferred in high-definition from the 35mm restored version by La Cinémathèque de Toulouse. As would be expected from older print materials, there is a noticable amount of film grain that is fully reproduced in HD here. However, the edition is quite pleasing with its high-definition transfer that is well-balanced but a little dark across the greyscale range, nonetheless holding open shadow areas in the picture that were previously plugged-up in older video transfers. A few shots are distractingly jittery, with the picture jumping about in the frame. We wish that picture stabilization had been performed on the preservation materials or on the video scan.

The edition is presented with new video-based English language intertitles.

Excellent musical accompaniment has been arranged from traditional Russian music by Rodney Sauer and performed by The Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra. The music conveys proper mood throughout the presentation and significantly adds to the enjoyment of the film.

We highly recommend this Blu-ray Disc edition of Sergei Eisenstein’s Strike, which has never looked as good on home video as it does here.

USA: Click the logomark to purchase this Region 0 Blu-ray Disc edition from Amazon.com. Your purchase supports Silent Era.
Canada: Click the logomark to purchase this Region 0 Blu-ray Disc edition from Amazon.ca. Your purchase supports Silent Era.

Musical accompaniment has been arranged from traditional Russian music by Rodney Sauer and performed by The Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra.

USA: Click the logomark to purchase this Region 0 NTSC DVD edition from Amazon.com. Your purchase supports Silent Era.
Canada: Click the logomark to purchase this Region 0 NTSC DVD edition from Amazon.ca. Your purchase supports Silent Era.

The films are accompanied by music scores composed by Ed Hughes and performed by the New Music Players, conducted by Patrick Bailey, with two alternative vintage soundtracks for Battleship Potemkin, one composed by Kryukov, the other by Edmund Meisel.

North American collectors will need a region-free PAL DVD player capable of outputting an NTSC-compatible signal to view this edition.

United Kingdom: Click the logomark to purchase this Region 0 PAL DVD edition from Amazon.co.uk. Purchase supports Silent Era.

This DVD edition, prepared by David Shepard, has been transferred from a positive print struck from the original camera negative.

We are impressed by the lively music score performed by The Alloy Orchestra.

The supplementary material is limited to audio commentary by Russian cinema historian Yuri Tsivian.

USA: Click the logomark to purchase this Region 0 NTSC DVD-R edition from Amazon.com. Your purchase supports Silent Era.
Canada: Click the logomark to purchase this Region 0 NTSC DVD-R edition from Amazon.ca. Your purchase supports Silent Era.
This Region 0 NTSC DVD-R edition has been discontinued and is . . .

North American collectors will need a region-free PAL DVD player capable of outputting an NTSC-compatible signal to view this edition.

France: Click the logomark to purchase this Region 0 PAL DVD edition from Amazon.fr. Your purchase supports Silent Era.

Other RUSSIAN and SOVIET FILMS of the silent era available on home video.