Dziga Vertov Analysis

Dziga Vertov’s Man with a Movie Camera is a patronage of present day industrialized soviet society; a fine analysis of progressive class distinctions prevalent within the soviet society; and predominantly the recognition of technology as a cinematic language helpful in depicting social and ideological truth. Here, Vertov implicitly illustrates his emotional bond with realistic cinema that renders life unaware and whose elegance in depiction takes place predominantly during post production editing. On the contrary, when compared to mainstream cinema where every detail is carefully planned before and during production whereby the narrative structure of the film is firmly linear by depicting a conflict, its development, and resolution. In Man

with a Movie Camera, Vertov uses a nonlinear narrative structure built around the combination of innumerable loosely connected themes that include: a representation of modern, urban life (in Moscow, the Soviet capital), the continuous human life cycle of birth, death, marriage and divorce, the role of technology in strengthening modern life and making human work more efficient towards the objective of social justice and an improved quality of life for all. For instance, in one scene we see a bourgeois in a salon getting his hair done and face shaved. This scene is juxtaposed with proletarian’s washing clothes, men working on railroad tracks and workers sharpening their apparatus. This inevitably enables viewers to connect their deeper emotions by relating themselves to the characters depicted on screen as well as viewing the film’s realistic surrounding as being their very own. Thus instead of relying on dramatized narrative, Vertov enables viewers to stimulate a strong personal connection with. We see Vertov implicitly suggesting this interpersonal connection by depicting an eye at the end of the film.
Here, Vertov uses a large number of shots juxtaposing a pair of eyes alternating with contrasting scenes depicting the city and its audiences. These rapid cuts happen abruptly and unexpectedly. The film then ends with one eye placed in in the center of a movie camera as the lens closes. This metaphorical placing of the eye can be seen as an implicit suggestion of the spectators viewing a mirror like depiction of their very own life. For instance, Man with a Movie Camera can be recognized as being complex, less ideologically dogmatic.
This is because of two reasons. First, Vertov uses the technique of disruptive associative montage to implicitly depict the film’s ideological narrative. Second, audiences are given the role of being an active participant capable of decoding this nonlinear narrative subjectively. Here, the audiences are vulnerable to misinterpret the metaphorical content illustrated in the film. For example, we see the film presenting a juxtaposition of a proletarian marriage ceremony with a businesslike bureaucratic wedding. However, the marriage later gets abolished at the Divorce Bureau. This exemplifies of how Vertov’s narrative is open to free subjective interpretation. This is because Vertov compels audiences to make their own interpretation rather than him suggesting his opinion when comparing two completely different facets of life. For instance, this scene can be considered as an implicit suggestion of class differences prevalent between the proletarian and bourgeois. On the contrary, the nullification of the businesslike bourgeois wedding can be subjectively interpreted as the need for an egalitarian and classless society. These illustrations allude to Marxist ideology. However, such assumptions are merely up to the viewers to assume. Also, at another instance, Vertov provides a more thematic association for depicting such political statements.
This is because Vertov truly trusts in the idea of representing cinema as an autonomous art whereby photographic composition, juxtaposition and narrative are predominant aspects in allowing spectators to open up their subconscious and think subjectively. For example, Vertov uses a crosscutting shot to present a proletarian woman doing laundry to a supposedly middle class women drying and shampooing her hair. Thus audiences are open to assume the unequal class differences prevalent without Vertov directly suggesting the known class difference prevalent between the proletarian and the bourgeois. This alludes back Vertov’s notion of filmmaking functioning as a cinematic language whereby film not only depicts the everyday actuality of the soviet people but also highlights the strenuous procedure involved in the production and illustration of the film. Here, Vertov captures unique depictions. For instance, the camera operator is shown lifting the heavy filmmaking instruments up and down the stairways; the vehicle used to film tracking shots of other cars; the ditch excavated next to the train tracks to get tilt-ups and close-ups of the train passing from above; the trimming and splicing together of a film from fresh footage; the projectionist packing the camera and setting it in movement. Here, Vertov implicitly exemplifies one of the most modern, or rather post-modern principles at work in introspective fashion, whereby the work of cinema should always reveal and remark on its own procedure of creation.
This is exemplified in the film’s opening introduction.

Here, Vertov dictates spectators to assume a participatory role in giving interpretation to the finished film. For instance, Vertov constantly uses stop-motion and substitution splicing. These techniques are used to make the chairs of the movie theater fold down supernaturally as if to greet his viewers. And even though the film does represent Soviet society positively in terms of being modern, growing, and advantageous to the proletarians whose labor is now accurately valued and compensated with beach trips organized by the government, the film does have room for interpretation and even components of social critique. For example, one might question why, in a progressive soviet society where there is a beneficial unification of technology and human labor seemingly at every turn, where there is an emphasis on public services (ambulances, fire brigades, medical services, health and hygiene in general), there are still homeless people young and old sleeping on park benches or the ground. In addition, Vertov illustrates these same industrial workers abusing the efficient mass production of consumer goods: during their leisure time, certain wayward workers drink champagne to excess in a bar where rows and rows of champagne bottles are shown being opened. While simultaneously, the viewers see a class hierarchy prevalent in the Soviet Union. For instance, a wealthy family in a car has a driver who carries their bags inside as a barefoot, probably homeless child crosses paths with them entering the building. We also see wealthy men and women satisfy themselves lazily in a salon being shaved and having their hair washed, while the proletarians work hard in the polluted and hazardous factories or mines for their own welfare. The inevitable summary is that for all its commendable characteristics and progress, Soviet society still has challenges to overcome before classless equality becomes a reality. The key to

enlightening viewers towards these areas for improvement is through the use of cinematic language, the perfect instrument in Vertov’s perspective, because it is a “Kino-Glaz,” an artificial eye that allows spectators to see the world from a different perspective and understand certain truths about society. The film emphasis and alludes to the notion by depicting close-ups of the camera lens, which at one instance is superimposed with an image of the human eye and a second smaller image of the cameraman turning his camera. In sum, Vertov’s approach to cinema is an endorsement of Soviet ideology, which is less ideologically dogmatic and gives spectators higher interpretative freedom that Vertov affords the viewer.