Stalker (1979)

A guide leads two men through an area known as the Zone to find a room that grants wishes.

Director:

Andrei Tarkovsky

Writers:

Arkadiy Strugatskiy (novel), Boris Strugatskiy (novel)

Stars:

Alisa Freyndlikh, Aleksandr Kaydanovskiy, Anatoliy Solonitsyn

Top Rated Movies #185 | 2 wins & 2 nominations.

Cast

Complete credited cast:
Alisa Freyndlikh	...	Zhena Stalkera
Aleksandr Kaydanovskiy	...	Stalker
Anatoliy Solonitsyn	...	Pisatel
Nikolay Grinko	...	Professor
Natalya Abramova	...	Marta, doch Stalkera (as Natasha Abramova)
Faime Jurno	...	Sobesednitsa Pisatelya (as F. Yurna)
E. Kostin	...	Lyuger, khozyain kafe
Raymo Rendi	...	Patrulnyy politseyskiy (as R. Rendi)

Storyline

In a small, unnamed country there is an area called the Zone. It is apparently inhabited by aliens and contains the Room, where in it is believed wishes are granted. The government has declared The Zone a no-go area and have sealed off the area with barbed wire and border guards. However, this has not stopped people from attempting to enter the Zone. We follow one such party, made up of a writer, who wants to use the experience as inspiration for his writing, and a professor, who wants to research the Zone for scientific purposes. Their guide is a man to whom the Zone is everything, the Stalker.

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Plot Keywords:

guide | writer | science versus spirituality | professor | ringing phone | 

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Genres:

Drama | Sci-Fi

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Certificate:

Not Rated

Details

Country:

Soviet Union

Language:

Russian

Release Date:

17 April 1980 (Netherlands)

Also Known As:

Stalker

Filming Locations:

Mosfilm Studios, Moscow, Russia

Box Office

Budget:

RUR 6,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend USA:

$20,540, 5 May 2017, Limited Release

Gross USA:

$234,723, 14 July 2017

Company Credits

Production Co:

Mosfilm, Vtoroe Tvorcheskoe Obedinenie

Technical Specs

Runtime:

162 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color (Sovcolor) Black and White Color (Eastmancolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Ranked number 49 non-English-speaking film in the critics' poll conducted by the BBC in 2018.

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Quotes

[first lines]
Stalker's Wife: [sub-titled from Russian] Why did you take my watch?

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Connections

Referenced in Sans Soleil (1983)

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Soundtracks

Meditatation
Written by Edward Artemiev

User Reviews

An interesting interview on the DVD

The Region 2 Artificial Eye DVD includes interesting interviews with the cameraman and production designer. The production designer reveals that the film was completed only to be destroyed because it had been shot on experimental Kodak and couldn't be developed - a whole year's work was ruined. He proposes the possibility that the authorities of the time didn't want it to be developed. The incident nearly destroyed Tarkovsky. He was finally persuaded to go back and film a new Stalker, this time on a shoestring budget.

What does the film mean? Ask me again when I've watched it maybe ten times.

Certainly the Zone means more to Stalker than the Room. The Room is his living, but the Zone is an escape, a sanctuary from the noisy, industrial rusting slum where he lives (captured brilliantly in metallic sepia). In the Zone everything eventually returns to nature - like a pastoral coral reef growing on a battleship lichen and mosses engulf factory buildings and tanks. His first action on arriving there is to leave the other two occupied while he communes with the natural things growing in the zone, the grasses, the dew, the soil, the tiny worm that dances head-over-tail down his hand.

A beautiful, great and puzzling film. But then if it revealed all its secrets straight off then, apart from the beautiful visuals and the soundtrack it would be pointless watching it again. Great art only leaches out its secrets gradually and only to those with the desire to learn them.