Mirror (1975) User Reviews (172)

Rules are there to be broken

[desh79 · 9/10 · 18 February 2005]

To many Mirror is possibly Tarkovsky's most inhibitive and uninviting work, be as it may not a story in the traditional sense but rather an assemblage of images, scenes, and thoughts which at first sight seem to have very little in common and just drift back and forth with no obvious literal explanation. It's only after repeated viewings and the realisation of what it actually was that Tarkovsky tried to achieve that it dawns that this is more than just a bunch of random scenes, but a timeless and highly important masterpiece which defies explanation. But I'll try anyway.

I personally hold Tarkovsky in very high esteem. There are many directors I would regard as good or very good (for instance Kubrick, Kieslowski, Ozu, or Miyazaki), but there are only two directors I regard as absolute geniuses: Akira Kurosawa and, yep, Andrei Tarkovsky. Interestingly this is for two solely different reasons - whereas I admire Kurosawa for the manner in which he managed to perfect the art of cinematic storytelling, Tarkovsky deserves praise for wanting to shake cinema out of its complacent acceptance that films should simply tell a story and little else. Mirror is further proof that Tarkovsky's body of work (which is limited in quantity - a mere eight films - but rich in scope) establishes that the Hollywood mode of narrative is not the only way in which film can create an emotional response from an audience. Of course Tarkovsky is not alone in having done so (Marker and Greenaway immediately spring to mind), but what distinguishes him from other "art house" directors is that he has managed to take this style of film making and drive it to a stage that can be described as almost perfect.

I personally interpret Mirror as a man's life flashing before his eyes before he dies; his relationship with his wife and mother (both played by the same person, in an ingenious move on Tarkovsky's behalf), his children, his friends, the history of his home land, his own childhood. However, Mirror is deliberately structured in such a way that it can, and will, be interpreted differently by different people depending on how they inscribe their own personal thoughts and feelings into the narrative. This is where Tarkovsky's genius comes to fore - to create a film which does not dictate to an audience how to feel by manipulating them via music or mise-en-scene, but to make it the other way around. In the case of Mirror, we, the audience, dictate the emotional response created by the images on screen and, that, ultimately is that makes it such a wonderful work and a true rarity. This is possibly another way the title of the film can be interpreted, in that it illustrates a wholly reflective style of cinema.

Those not accustomed to a slightly more disjunctive cinematic style are likely to dismiss Mirror as boring or dull because it may not necessarily correspond to their expectations of film. However, it is still something I would regard as required viewing for everyone since it shows that cinema can be beautiful without necessarily following the rules Hollywood has imposed on the rest of the film making community, and that ultimately rules are there to be broken. A masterpiece, no less.

I congratulate any person who absorbs this on first viewing

[bandw · 7/10 · 1 August 2012]

After I watched this for the first time I was left feeling confused, irritated, and a bit angered by what I perceived to be willful obfuscation. I was ready to give it 3/10 for the cinematography and Margarita Terekhova's performance, but then I read some reviews where I saw comments like: "masterpiece"; "best film of all time"; "my favorite film"; "perfect". I figured that there must be something to this film that I missed, so I thought it was worth a second try. I was helped by some reviewers who pointed out that the scenes occur in one of three time periods: in the 1930s prior to WWII, during the war (with footage from the Spanish Civil War), and in the 1960s. There is no story as such, but the memories, dreams, and current real life of Aleksei, a man in his 40s who is dying. Mixed in are documentary footage sequences and poetry readings. Things are complicated by Terekhova's playing two parts: Aleksei's wife Maria and Maria's mother. Also Ignat Daniltsev plays two parts: the young Aleksei and Aleksei's son. Oh, and at random intervals the film moves between black and white and color.

Armed with some background there *was* a reward for watching the second time. For one thing I was not so focused on the subtitles so that I could better appreciate the cinematography--the sensual quality of the wind on the fields and bushes, the lush countryside, the lighting, and the long tracking shots, for example. Even though I appreciated Terekhova's performance on first viewing, I was more impressed with her on second viewing when I was not struggling so hard to make sense out of things. There are some great scenes, like the extended one that has the young Aleksei looking into a mirror in contemplation. The future Aleksei is remembering an incident where his young self is contemplating what his future will be.

Some scenes are still mysterious, like the scene with Maria in a charred room with the ceiling falling in. Other scenes struck me as puzzlingly long, like Maria's trek to the printing office where we follow her from her house, into the rain, into the building, and through doors and down a corridor until she finally winds up at her desk. Why such a detailing of her trip to the office?

I like the concept of the film in its trying to capture how life is, as lived in our minds: in the real world, in dreams, in fantasies, and in memories--all jumbled together. To come across as so authentic, I figure that this film must be autobiographical to a great extent. In concept I would compare this to Fellini's, "8 1/2" and Malick's, "The Tree of Life." Both of these latter films were more successful for me, partly since they were easier to follow, but most importantly because they involved me emotionally at a deep level. "The Mirror" remained at a distance for me emotionally.

I have a problem with films that require research to appreciate. Maybe a third viewing would be in order sometime when I have the patience.

The Mirror is a haunting and deeply personal look at the life and memories of a dying man.

[WondrousMoose · 9/10 · 13 August 2017]

Film is a unique medium in that it communicates to us through our two most important senses, sight and sound. By these mechanisms, we experience much of the world around us, and by their reflections, we hold our memories of those experiences. Film is then in a special position to present the thoughts, beliefs, and actions of a character or characters by a creator talented enough to convey them. This can, of course, come in the form of a thrilling action movie with scenes and dialog that stick with us long after we see them, and in its purest form, it can come as an expression of the inner workings of someone's mind.

The Mirror, the fourth feature film of the Russian master auteur Andrei Tarkovsky, is a semi-autobiographical film presented as the memories and dreams of Aleksei, a dying poet. In no particular order, we see scenes from his early and late childhood, as well as more recent events in his adulthood. The unconventional, stream-of- consciousness structure of the film presents these scenes as one might recall them in real life, connected by moods and moments that prompt recollection of others.

Many of his earliest memories have little bits of dialog, giving a general sense of what is happening since the specifics have been long forgotten; memories of his adult life with his son and ex-wife contain more complete conversations.

At several parts in the film, Aleksei's memories are also paralleled by reflections on Russian history and society, as we are shown footage of soldiers in World War II and hear an excerpt from a letter written by Russian poet Alexander Pushkin, among other moments. Audio is also played over some scenes of Tarkovsky's own father, Arseny Tarkovsky, reading his poems. The camera moves deliberately through all these scenes as an observer; the long takes, as well as the movie's manipulation of time and sound, are key to accomplishing the intended effect.

Tarkovsky himself maintained that he structured The Mirror as one would a piece of music, focusing on the material's form rather than on its logic. More Ligeti than Mozart, though, this film is challenging and eschews anything resembling a standard structure or plot.

I often comment on the score of a film – especially a great one – and how it contributes to the overall viewing experience. The problem with The Mirror in this regard is that the formal score is so sparse that it hardly stands out as a strong or weak aspect of the film. Passages from J.S. Bach's St. Matthew Passion play through a few key scenes, and electronic ambient music plays over others. Instead, the deliberate soundscape of the film itself becomes a sort of score in its own right, such as a strong wind blowing over a field or the oppressive noise of a printing press.

Visually, the film is rife with haunting, surreal imagery. In a black-and-white dream, Aleksei's mother stands in a large, empty room, shaking water off of her arms and the hair covering her face, before the room dissolves around her in a dampened cascade of rain and wet plaster. In another, the same woman levitates several feet above a bed until a white bird flies over her. In one of the film's more well- known scenes, the family's barn burns as Aleksei's family and neighbors watch, their small figures helplessly standing at a distance as the structure simply burns.

Watching The Mirror is artistic bliss. The depth of many of Tarkovsky's shots is enrapturing; the texture of the world around the characters is palpable. You feel the cold, hard wood of the floors and walls of Aleksei's childhood home and the cold of a Russian winter. The film reaches a certain part of your mind and supplants a man's consciousness into your own, leaving you in something of a trance.

I can never fully explain this movie, and in that knowledge comes some of my enjoyment and appreciation of it. Each idea and realization I make about particular aspects of the film is nothing compared to the work as a whole. The Mirror is ultimately a film that is meant to be experienced rather than to be fully understood or explained. The human mind is itself nebulous, and how appropriate it is that a film meant to visually portray one should be as such.

It is all in the mirror

[Galina_movie_fan · 10/10 · 23 May 2004]

I just finished watching it. It's been several years since I saw it last time. I worried that I may not like it as much as I used to...

I should not have worried - I love it even more now if that is at all possible. I've seen it at different times of my life - first, as a college student many years ago in Moscow; I keep returning to it all my life.

When Tarkovsky's Zerkalo (The Mirror) was first released, it divided the audience completely. I remember how my friends were passionately discussing it. One girl was complaining that she did not understand anything; the movie was confusing for her, dark, disturbing, the children characters - sad, pale, poorly dressed. I remember her asking, "Why did they show a boy in the opening scene that had an awful stutter, and they never showed that boy again? What did it mean when the dying man in bed was setting a bird free? How did he get the bird on the first place?" Another friend of mine, a guy, tried to explain the things to her. He suggested that she thought about the times Zerkalo was showing, he tried to explain to her Tarkovsky's symbolism where the bird could be representing life and soul of the main character and the boy with the stutter could mean that it was most difficult for people to communicate and understand each other.

I only listened to their argument and did not participate because I had not seen the film yet. When it finally happened, Andrei Arsenievich Tarkovsky was presented at the screening and he talked to the audience before the show. I remember him repeating over and over that there were no tricks, no puzzles, and no tongue-in-cheeks in the film; that every symbol, image, dialog, and sound was there because they belonged there. He asked us if we had questions. Someone from the audience suggested that we saw the film first, and then, asked questions. Tarkovsky replied that from his experience, not many viewers would sit through the film and who ever would, usually leave in silence, not asking anything. And then he told us a story. After Zerkalo was completed, it was first shown to the group of the famous critics. After watching it, critics started to argue about it, trying to find the hidden meaning and make sense of what they just saw. It went on and on until the cleaning lady who came to the screening room and had been waiting for the end of discussion to do her job, asked them for how long they would stay? Someone said to her that they were discussing a very complicated film, and they needed time to understand it. Cleaning lady asked, "What is that you do not understand in this film? I saw it also, and I understood everything." Critics were silenced for a moment, and then, one of them asked the woman to share her thoughts on Zerkalo. She answered, "It is about a man who had caused too much pain to the ones whom he loved and who loved him. Now he is dying and he is trying to ask them for forgiveness but he does not know how." After the pause Tarkovsky said that he had nothing else to add about his film to what the cleaning lady had to say.

I never understood complains that Zerkalo is a very confusing, difficult, and dark film. No, it is clear and deep as a mirror. Tarkovsky said so himself, and I believe him. Every time you look at the mirror, it will show you new depth and reflections. Past, presence, future, memory, love, guilt, forgiveness, beauty, sadness, nostalgia, and sacrifice - the mirror reflects it all -just watch closely. This is the film about his family, his country, and his times. Childhood memory and the memory of the past generations glued together. The film is a look back in time and sad realization that children reflect destiny of fathers, as in a mirror. Destinies reflected one in another.

Zerkalo is not just good cinema, it is pure cinema. Like architecture is music in stone, Zerkalo is poetry on screen.

See it and die

[federovsky · 1 February 2005]

We are talking visual poetry here. For almost the entire film, every square inch of screen is minutely painted. Ordinary criticism doesn't apply, there is no comparison between this and any other film.

So many scenes have you holding your breath in awe. The smallest movement of light is choreographed precisely. A shadow across someone's face, the wind in the trees - these are not simply images of those things, but the ungraspable nature of life, regret, beauty, memory. So much more lies beneath the surface, as we are shown a reflection in a mirror that momentarily purports to be reality, but need not necessarily be interpreted as such.

The film's magic derives from Tarkovsky's surefooted ability to succeed with a succession of intense, beautiful images. He cannot put a foot wrong. Discontinuity in the narrative give the appearance of complexity, but Tarkovksy would insist that the basic thrust of the narrative is simple. The film is immensely personal, and the disconnections only serve to involve the viewer more – we are allowed to fill in the gaps ourselves.

To appreciate all this you need an essential sympathy for nostalgia and memories, for the passing of life, and for regret. You need an appreciation of a silent room and what it previously held, and of nature. You will need a sense of living in a turbulent and dangerous world, where all beauty is transient and sad. You will need to understand how small moments in life can become the most precious.

The film is tragic because, like memories, it lingers. It shows us details beneath the surface and how they can affect us. It shows life in the context of death, nature, the times and places we have passed through. The camera ponders and paints all this in beautiful detail.

Of course, real life is never so rich nor so intense - only momentarily so. The film wants to distil as much of that precious beauty as possible in a number of disjointed moments, coloured through memory and imagination, from childhood through to the point of death.

Apply it to your own life. There is no more than this.

The Incompatibility of Man and Nature

[two-rivers · 10/10 · 19 May 2000]

Ignoring other prominent thematic fields like family or marital problems and Russian or Soviet history (from Pushkin via Stalin to the current fear of a Chinese threat), two topics can be extracted from the movie which Tarkovsky seems to be very concerned about: 1.The confrontation of Man and Nature as two opposing powers, and 2.The continuum of time (the equation of present, future and past).

The importance of topic 2 can be made clear by just considering the film's structure: The different time levels are intertwined in an often deliberately confusing way so that it actually becomes difficult to identify them. The fact that the same actors are used to portray different characters of different time levels (Maria=Alexei's mother and Natalya=Alexei's wife; Alexei as a child and Ignat=Alexei's son) underlines the idea of deliberateness in addition. But the interconnection of times is also made visible by the recurrent theme of the so called 'déjà-vu-phenomenon': A character perceives a new situation or action as if it has already occurred before. In fact, he or she gets a notion of the predetermination of everything that happens in his or her life - a horrid thought, because then you can't change anything and have to accept willingly whatever an obscure determinating force has planned for you.

Let's concentrate on the last sequences in which the significance and the combination of these themes become obvious. First there is the scene where Alexei, who lives in separation from Natalya, lies in agony, overcome by an unknown disease. He just has the energy to make a last statement for posterity ("I simply wanted to be happy!"), then he retires from the world, asking to be left in peace.

But while he is on the brink of death, he still succeeds in wondrously stirring up life. He takes into his hand a moribund bird, which is lying on his bedside table, squeezes it, and then lets it go so that it can fly up into freedom.

Is it the same bird that breaks through a window glass in another scene, or that places itself on the head of that orphan boy whose parents have perished in the Leningrad blockade, as if he wanted to protect him?

The birds of "Zerkalo" seem to take up a symbolic function similar to the dogs in other Tarkovsky movies (i.e.: "Nostalghia", "Solyaris"): They represent some kind of link between Man and Nature; they are frontier guards at the gates of the unknown.

Tarkovsky sees Man and Nature as two opposing, incompatible powers. This becomes evident again and again, for instance when a vigorous wind repeatedly runs through grass and trees or when drumming rain drenches the landscape. Here Man can only watch in amazement, being unable to set something of equal value against the inscrutable elemental forces.

In the closing sequence Man appears at first as if he was embedded in the womb of Nature. Maria, the future mother of Alexei, is lying dreamily in the grass when she is asked by her husband whether she prefers a boy or a girl. But instead of answering his question she is gazing into the distance, and suddenly she sees herself as grandmother, walking across woods and meadows having little Alexei (Ignat?) and his sister by the hand. Then a juvenile Maria appears again, and tears are running along her cheek, but she is smiling at the same time. It seems as if the knowledge of the unstoppable progression of human existence into a single direction (towards old age and death) makes her sad and happy at the same time. She feels grief because of the inevitable loss of youth, but she also rejoices in happy relaxation for she has made out the rules of life as such and has accepted them.

At the end the camera follows the way of the grandmother and her grandchildren for quite a while. But again and again trees interfere and obstruct the view on the humans like gloomy barricades. Until finally both ways separate irredeemably: The humans have disappeared somewhere in the distance whereas the camera shot pans into the dark impenetrability of the forest.

Is there anything left to say?

[npcoombs · 10/10 · 3 July 2005]

If you have experienced Mirror, and by experience I mean much more than just having watched it (the experience may take multiple viewings to achieve) then you will realise the futility of describing or reviewing this film much in the same way as the inadequacy of a second hand account of a mystical experience.

Tarkovsky was a mystic: although his religious beliefs are well known there is much less acknowledgement of his conception of God. For Tarkovsky God was everywhere and in everything, his (its) presence is felt in the rustling of leaves in the breeze, the burning of wood, the rain falling (and falling, and falling) on damp fields. Humans exist as a sea of melancholy within the infinite beauty and wonder of nature.

Mirror is the closest art has ever been to portraying the mystical experience of one spiritually sensitive individual. The second hand experience can never be as profound as that from your own being. But an odd and sad experience comes from watching Mirror, the belief that your own interpretation of the world will never be so deeply poetic or deep as Tarkovsky's, and the world you see on the cinema screen seems more vivid and alive than real life ever will.

My Favorite movie of all time.

[UnholyBlackMetal · 10/10 · 1 August 2007]

There is a scene in Andrei Tarkovsky's The Mirror where a young child looks through a book of art. The camera is close, showing only the pages of the book and the child's hand as he flips from picture to picture. Occasionally he will stop and linger on a favorite drawing. It is obvious that the book is a treasured possession, whose pictures have yet to lose their magic for the young boy. At one point a leaf, pressed between the pages, comes into view only to be swallowed up again.

This seemingly innocuous scene, halfway through the movie, is just one small example of why The Mirror is unquestionably my favorite movie ever. The film is the pure essence of nostalgia and each viewing is a revelation of memories I had long thought lost. I too had certain favorite books that I would turn to over and over again, flipping through their pages and taking comfort in the familiar pictures. I too would often press flowers and leaves between the pages of books with my parents.

Watching this movie feels like memories of the past flooding back from some forgotten abyss. The grey rainy skies, the kittens licking up cream, the flickering kerosene lantern, the sledding on the hill, the small junk pile in the forest, the snow covered trees, the wooden floors and furniture, the windswept fields, the log fence, all of these things are important images from my childhood. And yet there is far more to The Mirror than that.

Tarkovsky reaches beyond mere concrete memories. Many moments in the film have an almost mystical appeal. The slow static shot of the disappearing hand print on the table mesmerizes the eye until the final trace has gone. The bottle that inexplicably rolls off the table seems to act of its own volition. The man walking away in a great field of grass who turns to the camera just as one mighty gust of wind sweeps across the field towards the viewer and is gone. Scenes such as these are joined seamlessly with the movie and serve to reinforce the almost dreamlike reality we are presented with.

The music, selected from Pergolesi, Purcell, and J.S. Bach is, amazingly, equal to the images. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the superlative final scene set to Bach's monumental opening chorus from St. John's Passion. It is the single most moving scene I have ever viewed on film, its central images consisting of little more than a woman biting her lip and a child shouting a great life affirming cry to the skies while Bach's painfully beautiful music builds to an epic climax. The perfect union of film and music found in this scene is staggering in its power.

I suspect I am not the only one who considers himself a kindred spirit to The Mirror. Growing up in rural Kansas without a great deal of money surely helps, but the images are more universal than the tone of these passages lets on. Perhaps that is part of The Mirror's appeal: to those who identify with it, it seems as though the movie was made only for them.

This theory gains a great deal of credence when I think of the parts of The Mirror I don't feel such a strong connection to. I had no lack of a father figure as a child yet that dominant plot point somehow doesn't stand in the way of my identification with the movie. I obviously didn't grow up in the middle of a war and have no connection with Russian politics and history, but again, it makes no difference. Oddly enough, these two central ideas in the movie don't even seem to register when I look back on it.

So just what is the mirror about? The Time Out film guide sums it up quite well saying: "Tarkovsky goes for the great white whale of politicized art – no less than a history of his country in this century seen in terms of the personal – and succeeds." That is a rather broad description and not a particularly exciting one. Of course if that were all that the movie was about, I would not be writing this review.

When it comes down to it, The Mirror is an elusive film to classify. I've seen it over and over and still have a hard time getting a firm grip on its structure. Powerful images with their own internal logic flit by, skittering at the edges of our consciousness like the memories of a lost day from our childhood. Complex narratives follow children and adults, past and present. Powerful documentary footage is interspersed along with slow motion dream sequences. The closest description I can come up with is that The Mirror is a collection of images, all related and all central to the human experience.

The Mirror is Tarkovsky's finest film, and for certain kindred souls it truly will be a mirror. A mirror to every memory long thought lost, it will show each person who looks a different reflection.

Beautiful but hard to connect with

[shannon-weiss · 6/10 · 1 December 2008]

Andre Tarkovsky's The Mirror is at once a personal recollection of a lifetime of sorrows and a remembrance of wartime emotions perhaps long forgotten by most. The filmmaker's autobiographical cinematic expedition is without form, which is both captivating and frustrating. Pleasing large audiences with a non-linear narrative is a more taunting task in the current day than it was in 1975 when the film was first released. The hyperactive visual style of most films aims to satisfy increasingly short attention spans; narratives are given predictable deliverances and little is left to the imagination. None of these qualities speak on behalf of contemporary films in comparison to abstract, subjective works however it is apparent that such films are less likely to 'succeed' today.

Tarkovsky's film is a stream of consciousness display of memories ranging from moments in Russian history to the most precise personal anecdotes. Some are conveyed through archival footage shot during World War II while others are simply retold as they are remembered; others still are so highly subjective that their context can only be assumed. The viewer must infer so much that any hope of interpreting a single strand of the film's interwoven story is next to impossible. The film's framework is structured around the divorce of a young boy's parents, a subplot that invokes a sense of emptiness and lost direction; these emotions are rampant in each of the film's stories within a story and yet the connection is often lost between narratives. Since the same actors carry over into various other microcosms of the film is it sometimes difficult to forge a division between numerous story lines. Regardless, whether or not their meaning is clear, the images on screen are marked by a sense of haunting beauty that evokes within the viewer an almost visceral reaction.

One scene lingers long after the film ends for it leaves a truly ghostly chill in its wake. As the boy is being carted from one parent to the other he finds himself alone in an unfamiliar apartment. He is told to await his father's return from work and yet when he enters a sparse room he finds a woman sitting at a desk. She asks the boy to answer the door and when he returns she is gone. At first the sequence of events appears to be simple transition between two memories happening in the same place. But instead of switching over to a new narrative, the scene takes a haunting turn: on the glass table where the woman sipped her tea remains a ring of condensation in the shape and size of her cup. As the boy approaches the table, seemingly aware of the sudden change, the ring of steam slowly evaporates, indicating that what had once existed is now gone. This image is reminiscent of the film's thematic undertone since it is can be read as a metaphor for memories: something that once was real that leaves only an imprint of itself before slowly fading out of sight and eventually mind. While this moment is effectively eerie it sets a standard that the rest of the film fails to live up to in its disoriented retelling of memories too subjective to be of much importance to anyone beside the filmmaker himself.

A delusion as beautiful as Lucifer's smile...

[LE020 · 10/10 · 28 April 2002]

"Zerkalo" is probably my favorite of Tarkovsky's movies-whic says a lot about the quality of the film. I believe that the Russian word "zerkalo"-mirror, is one of the most accurate descriptions of Tarkovsky's credo. The theme of the "home" and "family" exists in this movie stronger than in any of the other Tarkovsky's films. In "Ivanovo detstvo", Ivan is ruined the moment his family is killed. In "Andrey Rublev" the temple is the house. In "Solaris" Kris is guilt-ridenn on account of him being the cause of his wife's death, and in the end, like a prodigal son, he kneels in front of his father. The same guilt lays on the Stalker in the movie of the same name. In "Nostalghia" Gorchakov is dying of home-sickness, he constantly dreams of his home in Russia, and after death is rewarded by being taken to the home, placed inside a decreipt Italian temple in one of the most unforgettable shots in cinema's history. Finally, in "Offret", the hero becomes a sort of father for the whole world. But in "Zerkalo" family and home are presented as a foundation of human existence. Some scenes in this movie are among the most beautiful in cinema. Simply put, this film is something anyone who thinks and feels must see...

A very personal film

[frankde-jong · 7/10 · 14 June 2021]

"The mirror" is film with strong autobiographical elements. It gives an impression of the life of Alexei, who in reality stands for Andrei Tarkovsky himself. The film gives this impression by alternating between scenes were Alexei is 5 years old, 12 years old and a grown up man. The film also contains historical footings from the above mentioned periods. Adding to all this, different characters are sometimes played by the same actor / actress. This applies to the mother of Alexei when he is a child and the wife of Alexei when he is grown up. It also applies to Alexei at 12 years old and the son of Alexei as a grown up. As a result the storyline (if any) is difficult to follow, even for Tarkovski standards.

The film is however also a very personal one. During the film different poems are recited (written & spoken) by Arseny Tarkovsky, the father of Andrei. The mother of Andrei plays the mother of the grown up Alexei.

As usual in a Tarkovsky film there are very beautiful images. Very Russian ones such as wooden dacha's on the countryside, but also trademark Tarkovsky images such as a burning barn (see also "Sacrifice" (1986)) and drizzle dripping inside a building (see also "Stalker" (1979) and "Nostalghia" (1983)). The most remarkable image for me however was that of a young woman wih soaking wet hair after washing. It almost seems the ultimate inspiration for "Ringu" (1998, Hideo Nakata).

Memory and the Russian Experience

[davidmvining · 10/10 · 11 October 2021]

Movies about the self can often become masturbatory exercises that actively work to exclude anyone not intimately familiar with the filmmaker's life. Thinking back to a poetry class in college, I remember a girl complaining that you had to have read a biography of Sylvia Plath to understand literally anything about her poems because they were so intimately tied in with Plath's own personal interpretations of particular images (like, you have to know that the man in black in her poems is her father for the poems to make any sense at all). I preface this review of Andrei Tarkovsky's Mirror with that small anecdote because I feel like Tarkovsky's fourth film, the movie he tried to make before Solaris when it was called A White, White Day, is all at once incredibly personal, wildly experimental, extremely non-traditional, and really accessible. The entirety of what you need to know to understand and feel by the end of Mirror is here.

Essentially trying to replicate how the mind mixes memory, dreams, and imagination, Mirror asks the central question, never outright said, of "Who am I?" The title Mirror is a rather perfect one for the film. There are mirrors throughout, but the film's intentionally fractures story is about a man (the never seen as an adult Alexei voiced by Innokenty Smoktunovsky) reflecting back on his life while dealing with his ex-wife Natalia (Margarita Terekhova) and son Ignat (Ignat Daniltsev). The most obvious way that the past and present end up confused in Alexei's mind is that Natalia and Alexei's mother from his childhood are both played by Margarita Terekhova while both Ignat and the twelve-year-old version of Alexei are both played by Ignat Daniltsev. Alexei even says to Natalia at one point that when he looks back into his past he sees his mother with Natalia's face.

There's no real story here. It's really just a series of reflections that ultimately comes to a point. The reflections start in the past when Alexei lived with his mother in Moscow before the war and about the time that Alexei's father left them. They spent summers at his grandfather's house in the country. In the field outside the house stands a prominent bush. If a man turns at the bush and comes to the house, it is their father. If the man walks past it and continues on in another direction, it means his father will never return. A man, just a passerby (Anatoly Solonitsyn) who comes up for directions from Alexei's mother.

There's a story of Alexei's mother rushing back to her job at a printing press, absolutely terrified that she had allowed some bit of vulgar language slip through, showing up late in the rain and getting those few still there into a tizzy as she tries to find the error. Relieved at not finding anything wrong, she's suddenly confronted by Liza (Alla Demidova), her friend who suddenly dresses her down sharply for the entire event, explicitly saying that this was why her husband had left her. How does Alexei know of this? Why does he even think of it? In the present day, his mother had called him with news of Liza's death, so this is a related memory, probably cobbled together from different stories she had told him. The sudden change in tone and emotion feels like it's two stories smashed together, but that's also how memory can work.

There's an extended sequence of twelve-year-old Alexei in the winter at school learning to fire a rifle at the school's firing range. He's berated by his teacher. A trick gets played where a dummy practice grenade gets thrown onto the range, and the teacher throws himself on it, fully expecting the grenade to explode as he tries to save the class. There are present day concerns where Alexei meets with Natasha and they talk about Natasha looking for another husband (namely an unpublished writer that Alexei immediately speaks ill of despite not knowing) as well as what to do with their "idiot" son Ignat. That Ignat looks like Alexei's image of himself from decades before cannot be lost in the shuffle of images.

A twelve-year-old Alexei and his mother walk miles away from their country home to sell earrings to a neighbor, walking away without the earrings and only promises of payment from the woman's husband later. Present day Alexei lies on his deathbed. Alexei's mother and father are reunited after the Second World War's ending.

So many images, and ultimately it's about identity. Specifically Alexei's identity as shaped by the events of his life, namely by his mother's efforts, as well as his identity as a Russian. There's a letter that a strange woman asks Ignat to read, written by Pushkin to Chaadayev in the early 19th century, it's about how the czar and Orthodox Church were hurting Russia, leading Pushkin to embarrassment, and yet he would never leave his fatherland of Russia. It's about how despite all the sins of his country, he was and would always be Russia, a product of his nation. This letter gets a special place in the film, being read directly out loud, and when combined with some lines of poetry (written by Tarkovsky's father, Arseny) about how everything is immortal, it shows how the past lives within Andrei. The past he lived and the past that shaped him far beyond his own control is all part of what shaped him, and this film is part of Tarkovsky's efforts to come to terms with that, it seems.

How can this be relatable? It's incredibly specific to not only the Russian mode of thought but to Tarkovsky himself. I find it relatable because while the instance is steeped in Russia and Tarkovsky's personal history, the questions he's asking are universal, even if they have a deeply Russian affect. They may not be questions that keep me up at night, but they do find purchase nonetheless. This specific instance is told in such a fascinating and involving way, that I can't help but finding it engrossing.

On top of that, this movie is often gorgeous, like all of Tarkovsky's films. It's simply great to just look at. Jumping between different film stocks to help represent different perspectives and time periods (I would be honestly shocked if this wasn't also a way to limit budgetary concerns based on what I've heard of Soviet filmstock), Tarkovsky always knew how to point his camera to create aesthetically pleasing images. The standout, I would say, is an early sequence set in the country when a nearby barn goes up in flames. Filmed mostly from inside the neighboring house, the images have a depth of field and precision of composition that is simply a marvel to look at. Like many of the great visual stylists of cinema, Tarkovsky really understood that film wasn't just inherently two dimensional but three, knowing to bring depth to the image to enhance what the audience sees.

Out of a short career ruling the art cinema world, Tarkovsky's Mirror is the most artsy-fartsy film he made. Explicitly experimental in construction, it's the least accessible. However, I get swept up in it. The questions it raises, the strong performances, and the incredible aesthetics combine for an endlessly fascinating film experience that I really do enjoy.

Probably worth a second viewing

[erwan_ticheler · 6/10 · 19 May 2004]

I saw this movie,knowing that Tarkovski isn't an amusing filmmaker.Still I thought that it would be necessary to see it,since "Zerkalo" is highly regarded as a cinematic masterpiece.

Maybe it was because this was my first Tarkovski experience,but it bored me quite a bit.It's not that I don't appreciate "quality or better" film (I really adore the movies of Satyajit Ray,Ken Loach,Paul Auster,Federico Fellini,Luis Bunuel and Woody Allen for instance),on the contrary: I really like the "better" film. Still,this one didn't satisfy me.OK,it has got some fine cinematic touches to it and,it has to be said,the film is quite unique since Tarkovski's own father and mother have important parts in the movie (the father as narrator of his own poems! and his mother plays the role of his own mother in the movie) and since the movie is pretty much an autobiographical piece.

I'm not completely anti-Tarkovski now,I really want to see other movies of him but it wasn't up to my expectations.To me Tarkovski was a little bit too much of a Bergman-imitation.(there are some people who say that he is just that but I can't concur with that since I haven't seen his other work.)

What I will do is,maybe in a couple of years,to see "Zerkalo" once again knowing what kind of movie it is. 6/10

Film as a poem...not my cup of tea

[Filmdokter · 4/10 · 24 August 2021]

There is no denying that Tarkovsky is one of the most important Russian filmmakers of all time. And since I consider myself to be a massive fan of cinema, it is something I had to see. I liked Stalker but I'm not a big fan of Mirror. It really is film as a poem, a avant garde film where imagery is more important than story. And where Stalker still fascinated me, Mirror does not. For me it is too much a beautiful set of shots that are crawling with subtext and too little a decent narrative. Could be my lack of intelligence though...

Tops

[the_monocle · 26 March 2001]

It's not easy to make such judgments, but this is my favorite film. A personal choice, for sure, but what MIRROR achieves is the height of poetry and literature. Its final moment, if it works for you (and I can imagine it wouldn't for all), is a success of the "method of indirection" sought by poetry. Its effect is cumulative and devastating.

People often stress the difficulty of this film, but my only answer is to allow it to wash over you and allow it to have its effect. The first time I saw it, I was amazed, but a little baffled. The second time I cried. Each time since then I've teared up, if not actually wept. Its presentation, in its last shots, of the totality of the human experience, combined with the Bach's St John Passion, crushes me every time. And I'm not even Russian. Nor am I religious--this is the closest I get to religion. You just have to be human to understand MIRROR. This is the way of all Tarkovsky.

Existence...

[RetroEsteban · 10/10 · 8 November 2019]

Death. It is a process that is as old and as natural as Creation itself. Forests burn down, Oceans dry out, and Mountains crumble to dust. But such progress is not immediate as it takes key elements to be placed in result. For every action there is reaction, and for every decision there is consequence. And living at the very beginning cannot exist without dying at the very end. Throughout this duality, one goes through challenges and decisions that can be life changing to unimaginable degrees. Life changing in a way that can sometimes be a complete shift in reality. A shift that can be as beautiful as a nearby forest, or as terrifying as a small barn engulfed in flames. This is what I see in existence, This is what I see in Andrei Tarkovsky's 'Mirror'.

A dram within a dream within a dream

[jaegar12345 · 10/10 · 19 November 2021]

Have you ever dreamed that your dream is a dream in your dream? For this, just check this film out which is a masterpiece.. This is what a movie must be and ART. He successfully combines the inner self with harsh, wild outer world which is full of wars like in Spain. I will always remember its slow pacing which i never wanted to end. Heart-breaking, dreamy scenes are gorgeously planned and acted. A must-see. Lots of scenes are like a photographic work of art from the eye of Tarkovsky. It explains why Tarkovsky affected many directors in their works. Only the details used by the director makes the movie worth to see.

a poem written in light

[jvddoes · 10/10 · 16 April 2003]

Don't watch 'Mirror' if you're in need of beer in front of a screen. 'Mirror' is a poem written in light. There is the melancholy of loss, without bitterness. There is beauty, of life and unforgettable images. No sarcasm, no cynicism, no irony. How far this movie takes us from Holly Horrorwood. Deeply moving... but beware: It takes YOU seriously.

The most personal Tarkovsky film?

[TheLittleSongbird · 10/10 · 29 December 2014]

To this viewer, it definitely was. Mirror is a divisive film and one that not everybody is going to like or fully understand on first viewing, but it does come over as one of those films that should be seen more than once. Regarding myself, it was instant love on first viewing. Mirror looks amazing, which is not surprising as Tarkovsky's films are some of the most visually beautiful I've seen, the cinematography was so dream-like that it's enough to leave one in a trance of wonder. The scenery is striking as well and the whole film is atmospherically lit. Mirror also has a good amount of symbolism(which were relatively straightforward), but once again they were ones that bewitched rather than bewildered, the burning barn and the final scene were very telling scenes. Describing Tarkovsky's direction here, superb is not strong enough a word, Tarkovsky was a remarkably consistent director and a master of visuals and mood. While it may perplex some, I had little if any problem following the story, sure it's unconventional and not as linear as say Ivan's Childhood but it wasn't that hard to work out what it was about. As said before, Mirror is a personal film, very reflective and poetic and this all comes across in a way that's both poignant and uplifting. Pacing also wasn't a problem personally, Tarkovsky's films are known for their deliberate pacing that can be a turn off point but Mirror caught my attention throughout, almost in a trance actually watching it. Mirror's thoughtfully written, hauntingly scored(Bach has never been more effectively used on film) and beautifully acted, especially by Margarita Terekhova whose understated and moving performance is one of the best of any Tarkovsky film. In conclusion, Tarkovsky's most personal film is also another masterwork, visual poetry on film couldn't be a more perfect description. 10/10 Bethany Cox

Impenetrable for a very obvious reason

[itsahoverboard · 6/10 · 12 August 2021]

I'm not gonna argue the quality of the filmmaking or the very impressive attention to detail or the cinematography. It's a very well made film, across the board, objectively speaking.

I am just not interested in someone else's dreams. You can't communicate your own nostalgia to other people, no matter how desperately Tarkovsky seemed to want for it.

Now, that Andrei Rublev however - that is an actual masterpiece...

taking a walk through the portals of Tarkovsky's mind: poetic and dreamlike, with the flow of thought as opposed to narrative

[Quinoa1984 · 10/10 · 26 January 2008]

I can't say for certain how The Mirror had the impact it did, but it just worked like a kind of pure cinematic experience, minus the usual traditional narrative. There is something of a flow to the proceedings, but it's in pieces, fragments, the memory of (as late in the film we learn) a dying man. One person said in these comments on IMDb that there's something about the Mirror that deals with time, profoundly, and I think that's one of the keys to the picture. Among the few that are read, there is a poem narrated over documentary footage of soldiers walking along, and the poem talks of death as being only temporary, of someone dying at seven or seventy, but that there's a constant reality that continues even after one dies. There's something poignant being said there, almost out of reach, but plain as day. What can one do with a lifetime? There's childhood, adolescence, adulthood, marriage, divorce, and eventually the end.

So The Mirror is, at the end of it all, a reflection (no pun intended) on life spent in a society, in this case Russia which the film very much is rooted in, the history of it, and how one spends with those he or she loves or tries to care for, not to mention work and (occassionally) play. We see scenes of a woman named Natalya, who is also the 'mother' figure (most likely meant to symbolize Tarkovsky's own maternal figure), and in crucial scenes like her at her job as a proofreader, or socializing with a Spanish bullfighter, or when she breaks up with her husband to marry a writer ("is he Dostoyevsky?" he asks sarcastically), and even in dreams where she washes her hair, in slow motion, and walls and the ceiling crumbling around her. But after a while, the two blend together, with maybe only some little differences in how we view the women, played by a very great and deeply emotional Margarita Terekhova, who in viewed through the prism of The Mirror is left to the audience to decide when is which and how.

It should be a pretentious effort, and once in a while it does feel that way (a scene where the boy and his mother go to a neighbor's house, and the boy sits alone looking at the title object reminded me of "Mirror, Father, mirror" from Ghost World). But rarely from a European filmmaker have I been rattled with the challenge Tarkovsky presents. For one like myself who loves great poetry that enriches the mind, loves great technique with a visionary who knows few bounds with the camera careening and moving fearlessly in some scenes (particularly around the locations outside the house of the family in the country-side), loves things in style like lighting and perfect mix of B&W and color and little editing tricks that jar the senses like being witness to a fire-bomb thrown at the conventions of the usual in storytelling, and basically like a challenge to ones senses, The Mirror is fantastic. Few films combine themes of war, of social decimation, of familial crises, of the memories of things and objects (i.e. art book), and mortality like the Mirror, so even when it seems to distance the viewer with its approach to revealing it's not something to discard very easily on the whole.

I'd be careful who I'd recommend it to- it's the kind of film that would draw enough comments going either way (love or totally hate or confused by) as to be close to polarizing- but for those who want to take a chance, it's one of the director's best, a unique triumph of personal film-making. To see it on the big screen, I might add, is a significant plus.

Bitter memories

[x_manicure_x · 7/10 · 14 August 2021]

"Mirror" revisits the thoughts and memories of a dying poet in random order, with continuous time leaps, old newsreel footage, and people's faces overlapping each other (the mother becomes the wife, the man becomes the child, etc.). An obviously autobiographical film by Tarkovksy, who recalls his childhood days spent in the countryside during the war, the separation from his wife and child, and above all, the strong influence his mother had on his life. You would think Tarkovsky is the dying poet here, but the poems are written and recited by his father, who also happened to have abandoned his wife to later came back in an attempt to take his son away with him.

Different timelines, places, people, and cinematography techniques, all blended together in a chaotic yet visually powerful stream of consciousness.

CINEMA THAT ISN'T CINEMA

[azemillancy · 10/10 · 9 May 2023]

Tarkovsky the Russian legend long time ago made a film. How could one call it a film? It is no film. What is it then? Even Tarkovsky doesn't know. It's a moving picture. In fact, Moving pictures.

Every film has a story, but not this one. It doesn't needs one. Just what is shown is more than enough.

According to Tarkovsky, it's about his memories, the people he had around him, and his childhood. Maybe that's why it can't be sculpted in a story. Stories are stories, they are not something beyond that. But memories are beyond stories. They appear in strange and indescribable ways. Sometimes in dreams, in our imaginations, at times they unknowingly fly out from us, into our poems, paintings and stories.

The Mirror shows the dreams, memories, moments, past, present and future that are in a man's brain. The terribly indescribable nature of all that becomes the film's language.

The surreal picturisation of a Mirror, which shows the reflection of all that's greatly valued by the artist. In this art, the artist breaks down the conventional notions of cinematic art and crafts an art that advances the whole art of cinema. This isn't cinema, it's beyond cinema.

Difficult thoughts

[Atreyu_II · 6/10 · 31 March 2011]

This is a difficult movie to evaluate for its complexity. It's not that interesting or particularly good, even though it has its moments. This Russian film has no apparent plot. It appears to focus on a strange mix of contemporary scenes with childhood memories, newsreel footage and poetry. It also switches between 3 different generations of war.

Just like films such as Disney's "Fantasia" and Kubrick's "2001: A Space Odyssey" seem to have images transforming into music, this movie's images seem to transform themselves into poetry.

'The Mirror' (or, in Russian, 'Zerkalo') even makes use of scenes in black and white colored in a sepia tone, like in 'The Wizard of Oz' and the later 'Bröderna Lejonhjärta'. The scenes where that technique is used are uniquely filmed and very well made.

Overall, a very difficult film to judge and rate, although it's far from being great. That and the fact that there is a scene with a rooster being slaughtered (even if not directly shown) prevented me from ever watching this again. I am very sensitive to animal cruelty, I can't stand it.

A famous director and a very strange film

[Red-125 · 5/10 · 10 July 2020]

The Russian film Zerkalo (1975) was shown in the U.S. with the translated title The Mirror. It was co-written and directed by Andrei Tarkovsky.

This will be my first review composed almost entirely of quotes. First, from Tarkovsky's brief biography in IMDb. "Zerkalo (1975), is a dense, personal web of autobiographical memories with a radically innovative plot structure."

Next, from Tarkovsky's own writings. "It is not that I don't want to be understood, but I can't like Spielberg, say, make a film for the general public. I'd be mortified if I discovered I could."

Finally, from a critic describing Tarkovsky's camera work. " . . . an overhead tortoise crawl, preferably telephoto, across some place of soggy terrain, a river bed, or forest floor covered with lichen, bottles, rusty tools, and assorted moldy detritus."

OK--it's embarrassing to say, "I just didn't get it." The movie has an extremely high IMDb rating of 8.1. Clearly, many people saw greatness that I missed.

I raised my original rating to a 5 because of the lovely actor Alla Demidova, who played a major role. This is a case where I say, "Did other raters see the same movie that I saw?"