When the Soviet Politburo commissioned Andrei Tarkovsky to direct Ivan's Childhood, they expected a rousing patriotic tale of a brave boy soldier defending mother Russia.
Released in 1962, Ivan's Childhood, was acclaimed as a masterpiece, however the Politburo found it profoundly disturbing, and unable to say exactly why, engaged in atypical act of historical revisionism: Premier Nikita Kruschev declared there had been no child soldiers.
This is somewhat contradicted by photos of victorious Russian soldiers posing on the Reichstag steps, with a uniformed boy prominently in front.
Early in World War II, Russian troops regularly adopted children as their unofficial company mascots. Soviet leaders quickly appreciated the propaganda potential, enlisted them as official uniformed soldiers and made stirring films of their brave battlefield exploits.
Strange as it may sound, Tarkovsky used these boy soldiers to construct a film about love.
In young Ivan's dreams, we see the love for his dead mother now curdled into hatred for the Nazis. And among the soldiers, there's a complex web of love for each other - whether it's the men who love Ivan as a company mascot or a frustrated lieutenant unable to express his love for a fellow woman officer.
Ivan's Childhood also contains many scenes of exceptional beauty, with the birch forests recalling the work of American photographer Ansel Adams.
But this is war after all and what makes Ivan's Childhood so disturbing is the sucker punch it delivers at the end. Until then the war is abstract, only felt through the ruined landscape the characters inhabit. No one is killed on screen. In later years, one of Ivan's lead actors said: "All film is fantasy: it's not reality."
Tarkovsky alludes to this when Ivan leafs through captured German documents and encounters Albrecht Durer's engraving of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Ivan sees Death riding his horse and recognises it as a Nazi soldier he has seen riding a motorbike. Rather than it being childhood naivety, Ivan has recognised in the fantasy of Durer's artwork a solid reality he has seen.
And the sucker punch? This is when reality intrudes on fantasy. Tarkovsky grafts in documentary footage taken when the Soviets took Berlin, which blends seamlessly with the preceding film. It takes a few seconds to realise what has snuck past our eyes: Film of Goebbels and his dead family, laid out for inspection, and a German officer hanging in an attic, surrounded by the family he had earlier shot. It's little wonder the Politburo was so disturbed.
Tauranga Film Society will screen Ivan's Childhood next Wednesday, 6.20pm at Rialto Cinema. Contact Neale: neale@orcon.net.nz or phone 07 573 4157
