What is Soviet Montage Theory?
Soviet Montage Theory represents an incredibly technical and highly influential period of filmmaking that dates back to the 1910s and 1920s in Soviet Russia. Recognized as perhaps one of the most influential filmmaking movements of all time. Soviet Montage Theory was founded by Moscow Film School teacher, Lev Kuleshov.
But what is Soviet Montage Theory and what does it mean in reference to filmmaking?
What is Soviet Montage Theory?
Soviet Montage Theory is a filmmaking movement that took place in the 1910s until the early 1930s and includes five different types of films: Metric, Rhythmic, Overtonal, Tonal, and Intellectual.
The Soviet Montage Theory movement was not only incredibly influential. But it also recognized as a changing time for film editing on a worldwide basis.
In filmmaking, the world “montage” represents a connection of individual pieces to produce the finished project. These pieces could be pieces of film, individual music pieces, or individual images. Together they connect to produce a cohesive montage.
A Combination of Sorts
According to Moscow Film School teacher Lev Kuleshov, Soviet Montage Theory represented the combining of films to produce a finished film.
With film stock incredibly difficult to come by in Russia during the early 1910s, filmmakers and students were forced to find other ways to work within the industry.
The goal of Soviet Montage Theory, thus, was to produce a combination of shots. That would evoke a completely different feeling each time when combined.
Rather than collectively producing footage that maintained continuity, Montage used dialectical collision of images to produce meanings behind the films and was not concerned with a script but rather with a synthesized association between each shot from one to the next.
Editing is Key
Thus, Soviet Montage Theory relies heavily on editing rather than on the idea of delivering everything in a single frame because one frame may not be enough to fully convey an idea or emotion to the audience.
Thus, through what would eventually become known as the Kuleshov Effect, audiences would view multiple separate images to produce a subconsciously collective context although the editor was simply cutting from various visuals to produce changed readings.
Different Types of Montage in Film
So along with Soviet Montage Theory came the idea that different types of Montage could be created in film to produce the desired viewer’s interpretation of the sequence.
Each montage would typically be used in a radical manner in those times. However we still see montage used in modern cinema with much less radicalism involved.
Here’s a look at the various types of montage in filmmaking and cinema:
Intellectual Montage
The primary purpose of intellectual montage was to entice a different emotion from the viewer with each shot and it is also known as the Kuleshov Effect. The filmmaker communicates to the audience through editing of the film.
Tonal Montage
The purpose of tonal montage is to use two or more shots that each support one-another and work together, opposite of Intellectual montage, to establish a tone by editing the shots together with a similar theme.
Metric Montage
The purpose of metric montage is to establish visual pace for the film.
Rhythmic Montage
Rhythmic montage is responsible for keeping the pace both from an auditory sense and from a visual sense.
Overtonal Montage
A mix-up of the other types of montage, overtonal montage represents a filmmaker’s understanding of all four types of montage. And ability to establish a pace, keep the pace, elicit an emotional response. And exaggerate that response with contrasting and/or supporting images.
A Product of Its Time
As you can see, when you ask, “What is Soviet Montage Theory?” there is a lot that comes to mind. This historical filmmaking period represents Soviet Russian creation of film.
Which focused heavily on film editing. Due to the lack of film stock available for the creation of new films and videos at the time.
