Stalker

Stalker

Director: Andrei Tarkowski
Country: USSR

1979 | 155 min. | Russian
Subtitles: German, English
FSK 12

Cast_ Aleksandr Kaidanovsky, Anatoly Solonitsyn, Nikolai Grinko, Alisa Freindlikh, Natasha Abramova Screenplay_ Arkady Strugatsky, Boris Strugatsky Camera_ Alexander Knyazhinsky Rights_ trigon-film

In a post-apocalyptic landscape, there is said to be a place where every wish can come true. A profound, politically and metaphysically prophetic work.

Following an inexplicable event, a mysterious Zone emerges on the outskirts of a small town. Entering it is extremely dangerous. Only the Stalker knows its secrets well enough to guide his clients, a writer and a physics professor, safely through. Their destination is a legendary room said to have the power to fulfil their deepest desires. But will they have the courage to enter?

With minimalistic visuals, the legendary Russian director opens up an apparently inexhaustible theological and philosophical richness. Created during the Cold War and amid nuclear anxiety, his magical end times vision remains overwhelming.

Director

Andrei Tarkovsky (1932–1986) is one of the defining filmmakers of the 20th century. By using long takes (or, to borrow his famous phrase, “sculpting in time”) and dreamlike, poetic imagery, his films address the great metaphysical and socially pressing questions of his era. Fearing that he would be barred from working in the USSR, in 1983 he went into exile in France.

Screenings