Stalker (1979)

User Rating:

8.1/10   

Director:

Andrei Tarkovsky

Writers:

Arkadi Strugatsky (novel) &
Boris Strugatsky (novel) ...

Release Date:

17 April 1980 (Netherlands)

Genre:

Adventure | Drama | Fantasy | Mystery | Sci-Fi

Plot:

Near a gray and unnamed city is the Zone, an alien place guarded by barbed wire and soldiers. Over his wife's numerous objections...

Plot Keywords:

Stalker | Writer | Barbed Wire | Hope | Alien

Awards:

2 wins & 1 nomination

Cast

Aleksandr Kaidanovsky	...	Stalker
Alisa Frejndlikh	...	Stalker's Wife
Anatoli Solonitsyn	...	Writer
Nikolai Grinko	...	Scientist
Natasha Abramova	...	Martha, Stalker's daughter
Faime Jurno
Ye. Kostin
R. Rendi

Also Known As:

Сталкер (Soviet Union: Russian title)

Runtime:

163 min

Country:

West Germany | Soviet Union

Language:

Russian

Color:

Color (Sovcolor) | Black and White | Color (Eastmancolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Italy:T | Iceland:L | UK:A (1980) | UK:PG (1991) | Australia:M | Australia:PG (DVD rating) | South Korea:15 | Argentina:13 | Chile:14 | Finland:K-12 | Sweden:15 | West Germany:12 | Hong Kong:I | Singapore:PG

Filming Locations:

Dolgopa, Russia

Company:

Gambaroff-Chemier Interallianz

Trivia:

When the Stalker is referred to as 'Chingachgook' and 'Leatherstocking', these are references to characters in James Fenimore Cooper's "The Last of the Mohicans".

Quotes:

Writer: My conscience wants vegetarianism to win over the world. And my subconscious is yearning for a piece of juicy meat. But what do I want?

Movie Connections:

Featured in Uzak (2002)

Soundtrack:

La Marseillaise

Journey into Fear

The characters at the heart of Tarkovsky's "Stalker" are people who embark on an arduous journey only to discover that they had no idea what they wanted to gain from it. The central character is a "stalker," a man who makes a living by illegally escorting people through a restricted area to The Room, a place where their greatest wish will supposedly come true. Exactly why the area is restricted is never made perfectly clear; in the novel this film is partially based on, "The Roadside Picnic," it was a site where aliens briefly landed, and The Room was an object they left behind almost as if it were refuse. But Tarkovsky would rather not settle for such a flat explanation. To him, The Room is a place that means different things to the people who journey there, and the stark, ravished landscape they must journey through consists of the phobias and anxieties that they can hardly bear to face. The expedition the men experience is a long and often maddening one, and there are many scenes where the camera lingers on a beautifully composed shot so that the viewer can take time to understand how the characters fit into the settings and how those settings form both natural and supernatural obstacles.

Andrei Tarkovsky was an artist who did not like giving solid answers to the questions his films posed. He sculpted his stories so that viewers who had the patience and self-discipline to stay attentive all the way through could draw their own conclusions. If there is any specific meaning to "Stalker," it is that we have to fully understand anything for which we are willing to alter our lives.