One Day in the Life of Andrei Arsenevich
Chris Marker
1999 | 55 min | Colour & B/W | Digital

"Chris Marker’s One Day in the Life of Andrei Arsenevitch is perhaps the best film yet made by one (great) film-maker about another. A revelatory document, loving, lucid and lyrical, on the elemental structuring of Tarkovsky’s work, it marries moving footage of the terminally ill director shooting and struggling to finish his final film The Sacrifice with an exemplary assessment of the films and their importance, humane, humble and always open. In its own essential way, it too is a masterpiece." – Gareth Evans

Through film clips, journal entries, and personal musings, One Day in the Life of Andrei Arsenevich is renowned French filmmaker Chris Marker's homage to his friend and colleague, Andrei Tarkovsky, who died in 1986.

Widely regarded as one of the greatest filmmakers of the 20th century, and certainly the most important post-War Russian filmmaker, Andrei Tarkovsky has achieved a mythic status with such visionary masterpieces as Andrei Rublev, Solaris and Stalker. His stylistic idiosyncrasies: minimal plots, fragmented narrative, and long takes have become staples of the modern art film. His confrontations with the Soviet government, the censorship of his films, and his eventual exile only contributed to his mystique.

Through close readings of Tarksovsky's films – including rare scenes from his student film (an adaptation of Hemingway's The Killers) and a practically unknown production of Boris Goudonov – Marker attempts to locate Tarkovsky in his work. Parallels drawn by Marker between Tarkovksy's life and films offer an original insight into the reclusive director. Personal anecdotes from Tarkovsky's writings – from his prophetic meeting with Boris Pasternak (author of Dr. Zhivago) to an encounter with the KGB on the streets of Paris (he thought they were coming to kill him) – pepper the film.

With behind-the-scenes footage of Tarkovsky obsessively commanding his entire crew (including famed Bergman cinematographer Sven Nykvist, during the filming of a complicated sequence from his final film The Sacrifice), and candid moments of Tarkovsky with his friends and family, bedridden but still working on the editing of his final film, One Day in the Life of Andrei Arsenevich is a personal and loving portrait of the monumental filmmaker.

Part of our season on Andrei Tarkovsky