Rating: 
Summary: A mixed bag
Review: "Man with the Movie Camera" is a technically audacious film which chronicles daily life in Russia in the 1920's. Vertov's innovative use of rapid camera movement and split-second editing are often startling, at times dizzying to behold.The images which Vertov juxtaposes are incongruous and entertaining. In one frame you see a dog sitting on a sidewalk. In another, you view people huddled together going to work and then a close-up of someone brushing their teeth. Many scenes feature machines, factories and buildings representing Russia's industrialization. There is a sense of detachment and dehumanization conveyed in the starkness of the concrete and steel structures you see emerging over cities as Russia modernizes. Vertov introduced new and exciting techniques to the craft of filmmaking. Yet I found his use of these techniques excessive, self-indulgent, and distracting as if he were "showing off" his technical prowess instead of enhancing the story. Also, his repetition of the same or similar images dulls their impact. Still "Man with the Movie Camera" is worth seeing. But it's a mixed bag.
Rating: 
Summary: Everyday is a movie in one's life
Review: "This film presents a experiment in the cinematic communication of visible event, without the aid of inter-titles, without the aid of a scenario." Such explannatory opening titles are the only ones you will see in this 1929 Soviet-made silent film. Thence begins the visual tour we are taken through by "The Man with a Movie Camera" as he literally takes us along for the ride as he chronciles the better part of a day's usual goings-on in an agglomeration of Soviet cities. Hence the scene index on this DVD segments up this film with the aid of such chapters labeled: "The beginning," "Workday begins," "Open for business," "Still life in motion," Emergency," "Coal, steel, silk & water," "Workday ends," Exercise," "Special effects," "The pace increases," concluding with "End credits." I've included the above to give you an idea how this film achieves what other reviewers herein have characterized it doing. Images are literally thrown at you at various speeds by Vertov, the director. "Workday begins," for instance, is a montage of images---alternatively moving and stilled---of folks waking up, streets coming alive, trams embarking out of their depots; with shots of cash registers, typewriters, parked cars, phones & such all waiting to be put in motion. Then the movie camera lens that just showed us a woman washing her face, itself occupies the screen. Then we see this woman's eyes. Then a window shutter. Then a window. Then the camera again. Then window blinds. Then the woman's eyes yet again. Then the blinds again, followed by the lens, etc. We don't watch this film from afar, in short. Rather, we become "The Man with the Movie Camera" ourselves, as if we were the one running across a threshold, between street trams, or up a bridge---as we see the actual camerman do in this film---before we ourselves get to take in the view of the camera lens from such vantage points. In this manner the director is hoping to wake us up to life as it is; to see life as if our eyes are but camera lenses. It's makes for an interesting viewpoint---pardon the pun---to say the least; and accounts for the fact that "The Man with a Movie Camera" merits inclusion among the best silent films ever made, if not of all films made, as well. Sure, "the factory of dreams" as Hollywood was known in Soviet Russia, is an art form in of itself. Less known is "the factory of facts" which this film purports to represent. You wouldn't think that a 68 minute storyless silent film (albeit it with a captivating score) would be actually entertaining, but it is; even with multiple viewings! I, for one, have watched it 3 times and---most likely, will do so some months hence again. I hope I have been of some help herein & that I have piqued your interest in seeing this film. (If so, do listen to the audio commentary on this DVD after your first viewing.) Cheers!
Rating:
Summary: A mixed bag
Review: "Man with the Movie Camera" is a technically audacious film which chronicles daily life in Russia in the 1920's. Vertov's innovative use of rapid camera movement and split-second editing are often startling, at times dizzying to behold. The images which Vertov juxtaposes are incongruous and entertaining. In one frame you see a dog sitting on a sidewalk. In another, you view people huddled together going to work and then a close-up of someone brushing their teeth. Many scenes feature machines, factories and buildings representing Russia's industrialization. There is a sense of detachment and dehumanization conveyed in the starkness of the concrete and steel structures you see emerging over cities as Russia modernizes. Vertov introduced new and exciting techniques to the craft of filmmaking. Yet I found his use of these techniques excessive, self-indulgent, and distracting as if he were "showing off" his technical prowess instead of enhancing the story. Also, his repetition of the same or similar images dulls their impact. Still "Man with the Movie Camera" is worth seeing. But it's a mixed bag.
Rating:
Summary: A mixed bag
Review: "Man with the Movie Camera" is a technically audacious film which chronicles daily life in Russia in the 1920's. Vertov's innovative use of rapid camera movement and split-second editing are often startling, at times dizzying to behold. The images which Vertov juxtaposes are incongruous and entertaining. In one frame you see a dog sitting on a sidewalk. In another, you view people huddled together going to work and then a close-up of someone brushing their teeth. Many scenes feature machines, factories and buildings representing Russia's industrialization. There is a sense of detachment and dehumanization conveyed in the starkness of the concrete and steel structures you see emerging over cities as Russia modernizes. Vertov introduced new and exciting techniques to the craft of filmmaking. Yet I found his use of these techniques excessive, self-indulgent, and distracting as if he were "showing off" his technical prowess instead of enhancing the story. Also, his repetition of the same or similar images dulls their impact. Still "Man with the Movie Camera" is worth seeing. But it's a mixed bag.
Rating: 
Summary: A Russian movie classic
Review: Dziga Vertov's 1929 film is a montage of one day in the life of the Russian people as told (or viewed) by a cameraman. Starting in a movie theater with the audience preparing to view the film, Vertov's cameraman takes them on a whirlwind tour of Russian life, from daybreak and visions of people sleeping on the streets and benches, interspersed with a young woman lying in her comfortable bed, to the everyday people working in the mines and factories. It's a fascinating way to show the usage of the camera as a tool to document life, to display reality. In addition, the viewers get to see how a movie is made, with many shots of the cameraman hulking the huge camera from place to place, cranking the handle in order to get the desired sequence on film. The version I saw also has a great score by composer Michael Nyman and written biographies of the Dziga Vertov and michael Nyman. A unique film that is a must-see for any cinophile.
Rating:
Summary: Kino Eye
Review: Dziga Vertov's Man With the Movie Camera (1929) is a narrative-free silent film plucked right from Stalinist Russia. In it, Vertov envisions a world as seen from the lens of a camera...marriages, divorces, deaths, accidents, transportation, daily work, sports, beach-going...everything is seen from the camera's eye view. The film is edited using a number of innovative techniques, and throughout the 68 minute assault on your visual sense, you as viewer basically BECOME the Man with the Movie Camera, but because we frequently see a man with a movie camera, it becomes multi-layered. We are the camera filming the filmer. Vertov believed that film would triumph as a medium free of the narratives of literature or the standards of the other arts, that it could be truly an exquisite tool of the proletariat. Interestingly, he was not given approval from the Stalinists who felt that his commitment to aesthetics went beyond his commitment to ideology. One of Vertov's key themes is the comparison of human labor with machines. He wrote, ""I am kino-eye, I am mechanical eye, I, a machine, show you the world as only I can see it. My path leads to the creation of a fresh perception of the world I decipher in a new way a world unknown to you." Incidentally, a collection of Vertov's writings called The Kino Eye does exist in the world (1984).
Rating:
Summary: Great audio commentary
Review: Dziga Vertov's _Man With a Movie Camera_ stretches the Soviet theories of montage to the breaking point. Like most Stalin-era films, it appears propagandistic at first glance. But in its relentless exposure of the cinematic phenomenon, the film compels viewers to think for themselves, and reconsider what they see on the screen. It's clear that Vertov thought himself a good Communist for attempting to make his audience more self-aware, but Stalin's apparatchiks loudly disagreed; after all, nothing was more dangerous for them than a free-thinking proletariat. In addition, the film shows just enough of Soviet urban squalor to give the lie to official visions of a workers' paradise. With the support of the George Eastman House, video preservation guru David Shepard has restored Vertov's documentary-manifesto with loving care, even insisting on a 1.20:1 aspect ratio (which is slightly narrower than the average television set, hence a small black bar on the side of the screen). The musical score, by the Alloy Orchestra, follows Vertov's surprisingly detailed instructions to the letter. What really makes this edition impressive is its sole special feature: an audio essay by Yuri Tsivian that may be the best DVD commentary I've ever heard. We need more commentaries like this one, with true film scholars explaining the images in terms which are neither too technical nor too vague. A must-own.
Rating:
Summary: Great Part of Film History.
Review: I learned about this movie in an editing class. From that day i had to have it. Now theres not much going on with a story or plot as it was in the early experimental days of film but nonetheless it still is an amazing peice of work. The music is wonderfull. Definatly worth a try.
Rating:
Summary: SIMPLY CINEMA
Review: I love silent movies. The grammar of the cinema has been invented during this period. It's amazing to discover that what seems to us truly original or personal in most of our today geniuses was already there in these black and white movies, even in a better way. I am conscious that it demands a peculiar effort to the 1999 movie fan, but the reward is great. THE MAN WITH A MOVIE CAMERA is a 1929 russian movie directed by Dziga Vertov. A breath-taking musical score has been recorded for the reissue of this movie a few years ago. I still have this music in my head three days after having seen the picture ! You will also find in this DVD a really instructive commentary which is absolutely necessary if you want to appreciate all the subtleties of THE MAN OF THE MOVIE CAMERA. This motion picture is a kind of manifesto, without screenplay. It could have been a documentary but it's not. Certain moments are not so far from the surrealism one can find in the movies of Luis Bunuel shot at the same period. Other scenes of the movie are lessons of cinema that could have been given by, let's say, a Jean-Luc Godard. For instance, Vertov films a train coming with great speed towards the camera, then the man with the movie camera shooting the scene, then the audience watching the train coming on the screen. At this moment, one remembers that one of the first movies ever filmed was, in 1896, the entrance of a train in a french railway station. The audience screamed and left the room in a hurry, 35 years later no one moves. If you are curious about cinema, if you definitely consider it as an art, if you like to have images haunting your mind during days, then you really should consider THE MAN WITH A MOVIE CAMERA as A DVD for your library.
Rating:
Summary: A uniquely fascinating 1929 Soviet 'documentary'.
Review: I was curious to see "Man With the Movie Camera" ever since reading 'Kino-Eye', the director's rather bombastic manifesto about the virtues of nonfiction film making. Soon after the DVD was released, I ordered it online. I was not at all disappointed upon satisfaction of my curiosity.
The film is all montage, not story or lecturing, and makes a fetish of modernization and industrialization. It derives its power from the pure artistry of editing, from the rapid justaposition of images and of snippets of action from everyday life.
There's something about the total effect of Dziga Vertov's film, its zestful "sense of life", its manic energy, that may especially (and very surprisingly) appeal to fans of Ayn Rand, the anti-Soviet novelist who left the USSR for the USA during the mid-1920s and who went on to eventually write Atlas Shrugged.
It's interesting that Vertov is considered one of the trailblazers of cinema verite, the recording of the quotidian as-it-happens, whereas his film is actually a collage of kinetic images symphonically woven into an architechtonic whole of visual and spirtual unity. A product of organizing intellect, not mere assemblage, his documentary does not so much 'document' as utterly transform -- it is not so much true-to-life as true-to-vision.
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