Fyodor Basmanov - Blog Posts

Ivan The Terrible Part 1 and 2 + art parallels

“Eagle Over 100,000 Acre Plain at Susaki, Fukagawa” - Utagawa Hiroshige, 1857 (detail) // “The Body of the Dead Christ in the Tomb” - Hans Holbein the Younger, 1520-22 (detail) //  “Portrait of Giuliano de’ Medici” - Sandro Botticelli, 1478 //  “The Lamentation over the Dead Christ” - Sandro Botticelli, 1490-92 (detail) //  “The Demon Downcast” - Mikhail Vrubel, 1902 (detail) //  “Fair Rosamund and Eleanor” - Frank Cadogan Cowper, 1920

I was NOT psychologically prepared to read Eisenstein’s screenplay for Ivan the Terrible. There’s a “deleted scene” where Fyodor Basmanov chases a Zemshchina girl who (understandably) thinks he’s trying to sexually assault her until he says “no, I just want your earrings,” then he takes her earrings and and holds them up (I’m going to say probably to his own ears), then his father comes in and takes them away. This emotionally destroyed me for reasons I can’t fully articulate.