Unpopular Opinion: Tarkovsky's STALKER sucks.

I tried to watch this a few years ago. I didn't make it that far.

A big part of it is Satantango generally perfecting what I expect from slow cinema. As I've said before, any slow cinema I watch, I compare directly to Satantango... or at least The Turin Horse.

Have yet to see either of those two.

While I trust the reviews must be great for a reason, the length of Satantango is just ridiculously long for a feature length film.

W.H.A.T.


ze fook.


Watch it in thirds like I did. You will NOT be disappointed if you liked the slow cinema of Tarkovsky.

Haven't seen it yet... the legend has so few films that I like to save a couple for the years to come.

Nostalghia is great btw. My least favourite of his currently is Offret which still has enough ideas and atmosphere to chew on...

Haven’t seen any Bela Tarr in fact. Maybe I should I start smaller than Satantango haha.

But the man has been on my watchlist for forever. Know about many of his movies and have seen many clips, screenshots and a few scenes. I love beautiful cinematography and have a soft spot for the black and white kind.

I dove headfirst into Satantango, actually. Set the standard ever since. But I even got through Empire and Shoah, so maybe it's my instantaneous "challenge accepted" behavior.

I am not a Tarkovsky fan. I don't get it. I've seen Stalker and Solaris. I don't think other people are trolling when they say they enjoy difficult works of art. But I could be wrong. Certainly the Dada movement was trolling. See R. Mutt's The Fountain for a little for reference.

Bolding mine, because I'm wondering if you've read the book or not. Your post reads like you played the game and then watched the the movie. But correct me if I'm wrong.

I don't connect with Stalker on a basic/emotional level that I need to feel that a film is great. But that said I think that as a vision it is really interesting, and we see the danger of the Zone in the effect it has on the people in it.

I would rate Solaris and Ivan's Childhood (those trees!!) above it in terms of movies that make me feel something powerful.

I think it's natural to feel this weird contempt when you don't connect with something that a lot of people laud as a "masterpiece" or what have you, and especially when that artwork is deliberately challenging in some way. (I feel an almost visceral anger whenever I see Shawshank Redemption at the top of the IMDb 250, for example). But there's a big gap between not liking something and something being bad.

I'm sure that there are people who go into Stalker knowing that it's supposed to be a great film and then feel some pressure to like it and praise it. I myself remember feeling confused at not loving it on my first viewing (and on my second viewing for a HoF here), and thinking that maybe I just didn't "get it."

But I think it's disingenuous to assume that most people who say they like a movie are just faking it to fit in or pretend to be smart. I really love Jeanne Dielman, and my admiration for the film only grew on a second viewing, writing my thoughts out, and conversation about the film with others. According to some people, though, I'm just pretending to like the movie? Please.

If you've bounced off of Stalker, I'd recommend Ivan's Childhood, which is the most narrative-grounded of Tarkovsky's films that I've seen and I think it's pretty strong.

I thought that LostInSauce had read the book, but maybe they were just comparing the movie to the book?

My advice for movie fans: watch the movie first, then read the book. Everytime somebody reads the book first they say the movie sucks. Well no kidding the human mind can envsion cooler stuff than in film maker can put on the screen, not to mention a book can pack in details that a movie, unless it's 4-6 hours long, can't do.

You would think the following statement would imply they have:
But given the extra comment about there being no life in the zone in the movie made me wonder if they've read the book and are instead comparing it only to the video game (I've only seen bits and pieces of someone playing it. It's a horror, action, FPS, from what I've gathered, more akin to the movie, Annihilation, in terms of tone (mutated monster animals) but a lot more plot, exposition, and a lot more shooting). Combine that with the part where they said the only interesting part of the movie was the break-in, which had people shooting automatic weapons, and liking The Terminator (again, an action movie with people shooting guns), it made me wonder if they've read the book.

Because the book has lots of people in it and talking, but no expedition into the Zone encounters anything living; it's all people outside the Zone, talking about the social fabrics developing around the Zone - the smuggling of items out of the Zone, researching the Zone. There's a few pages dedicated to them wondering why the aliens even came to earth (the movie doesn't mention the cause of the Zone, which to be frank, I think things left unexplained are often more inherently magical and mysterious, such as why the stalker throws those nuts/bolts attached to the cloth/string. Never explained in the movie. Reading why in the book, it makes sense, but the reasons your mind may come up with in the movie feels more elusive and metaphysical, even if they are ultimately similar). I'm trying to recall if there are any scenes in the book where people are firing guns. I think maybe one where guards of the Zone (trying to keep smugglers/stalkers from coming in and out and presumably working on some tip off), are just kind of blindly shooting into the outer reaches of the Zone during the night in case any smugglers were trying to get anything out of the zone. The book has a caustic, wry, dark comedy to it.

And anywhere above where I said smugglers, just replace with the word smugglers or scavengers, because that's what they are, but with the name of "stalkers".

The book and the movie (and from what little I've seen of the video game) are completely different beasts. I suspect which one one encounters first may be indicative of which one they might prefer, but that might also be pre-selecting that the first one you watch is also just be an indication of which type of story you like to consume more.

Stalker is about metaphysical ideals that exists outside of space-time and shape our mental structures in space-time. These ideals are excesses that call or beckon us to them, they fill us with hope and anxiety, as we circle around them figuring out how to navigate those unexpected setbacks thrown upon us, and we struggle with the fear of their supposed "absence" (here we see Tarkovsky's Christian tendencies are best exemplified in this film). What if it's all for nothing? What if the goal itself is uneventful or even a necessary illusion? What comes after the goal is reached, is there no striving any further in life? Are we afraid of directly confronting it because it will reveal all of the repressed thoughts inside us all along? We are all stalkers, navigators, guides towards what we perceive to be the ultimate goal(s) in our respective lives. Tarkovsky tells us - the zone cannot be contained, tamed, repressed by political forces. It becomes apparent that the metaphysical ideals alluded to can only have as much reality as the desires that will them into existence. The nature of desire is that it operates outside of concrete rational knowledge. The zone of desire exists, but its existence is inferred by the indirect effects that it has outside the zone. Do we actually know what we truly desire, and do we desire what we don't know? The answers I strongly suspect Tarkovsky would give and one which I am inclined to agree with, is NO to the former and YES to the latter.

Book, game, movie. Played, watched, read them all. Book > Game >>>>>>>> Movie.

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Glad I'm not the only one. Sometimes I feel like the hype surrounding this movie is like an, "emperor has no clothes" situation.

Is there really something like this being planned? I got a really awful feeling about it if it is.

You've had multiple posters explain why this movie works for them, sometimes in great detail...but sure, let's instead default to the notion that people must be deluding themselves when they like something you found boring.

If he played the Stalker, I imagine this scene would play out much differently:

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Seen twice or maybe even three times. has definitely done nothing.

Admittedly, that's how boring I find it. I find it boring to the point where I struggle to believe that anyone could possibly like this movie.