Salient. An Organ of Student Opinion at Victoria College, Wellington, N.Z. Vol. 4, No. 9. July 30, 1941
[Introduction]
" October,"' or " Ten Days That Shook the World," is a Russian silent film made in 1927.
The two serious purposes of all Russian directors are the propaganda of the Revolution and the creation of a new proletarian art. The Russians were quick to realise the tremendous and almost limitless possibilities of the film as an art form, but at the same time they were forced by the scarcity of film in Russia to delimit the essential aims of the cinema and to export only the most fruitful potentialities of the new art.
Thus, even their earliest work makes a striking contrast with American films of the same period, with their over-dependence on the simple narration of a story using frequent sub-titles to explain the action. Soviet action is expressive and self-explanatory.