Written by: Arkady Strugatsky & Boris Strugatsky
Starring: Alexander Kaidanovsky, Anatoly Solonitsyn, Alisa Freindlich, Nikolai Grinko
Rating: [4/5]
When given the opportunity to gain or possess our deepest desires, anyone would jump at the opportunity to achieve it, especially when it comes at a minimal personal cost to attain it. However, as explored in Stalker, this process simply does not come across as simple as one would think, and through this moody and incredibly ponderous film, we dive deep into this idea through a valley where nothing quite makes sense.
Making a living navigating paying customers through the Zone, where the laws of physics change, the Stalker (Alexander Kaidanovsky) takes on the Writer (Anatoly Solonitsyn) and the Professor (Nikolai Grinko) as his next clients to get to a room said to grant the desire and wish of anyone who enters. As the Stalker leads them there, he learns of their intentions of what they seek to accomplish then they reach it.
Stalker exists as such an essential film within the filmography of a legendary filmmaker in Andrei Tarkovsky. A filmmaker who requires a plethora of patience when ingesting his films because of the methodical pace he takes in with his narratives and how he fleshes out his themes in anything but a straightforward manner. It thus becomes quite inaccessible for a general audience to just jump on and watch one of his films without having their patience tested. Granted, as someone who has watched several of Tarkovsky’s features prior to this one, Stalker still managed to test me through everything it presents and the manner in which it does. What it explores about faith and the downfall of humanity makes for such an enriching experience.
Spending the majority of this feature with three unnamed men who travel together already creates a bit of a detachment from them in their connection with the audience. With the Stalker himself, we do see his wife and kid indicating the man has something to care for but the other two exist as their own individuals and when we learn of their motives it makes for quite the dissection of their viewpoints and the way it could jeopardize things for everyone else. With its runtime, they certainly get plenty of time to share everything happening to go through their minds, especially with the unnerving threat of the danger existing in the Zone and how they may lose their lives in the process.
This film then becomes a combination of conversations taking place through this walking and a simply majestic viewing experience to watch as Tarkovsky and Alexander Knyazhinsky craft some visually striking images. Some of the best the medium of film has ever had to offer as we continue to explore the Zone and everything inhabiting it. This area contains so many dangers presented to these characters but the Stalker has developed his methods of navigating within it. A place where everything operates separately from how one would expect in reality allowing for some trippy visuals and landscapes to make you look twice at what we actually see and the way the characters interpret them. Coming right off of Solaris and Mirror, Tarkovsky certainly has shown an affection for these warping visuals and he continues this trend of strange environments and how it can impact these characters into having existential conversations. Whether up in space hovering over a strange planet or in this weird undisclosed piece of land called the Zone.
On this journey these conversations dig into some heady topics, the ones individuals typically do not try to have with others they have just met. However, in this feature, they manage to drill right into their particular views along with what it means to reach their deepest desire and what they will do once they achieve it. A story gets shared by the Stalker about someone who got in there, received their desire, and ended up committing suicide, which certainly feels like quite the warning to the two individuals, but only further begs the question of what good it serves. Typically mankind has proven not to handle an abundance of anything particularly well.
While admittedly a massive admirer of this feature, I find myself more so in the appreciation basket than necessarily loving the film outright. Elements of this feature certainly deserve love and adoration and perhaps stand as one of those films necessitating another viewing, something Stalker very much has warranted. With its patient pace and nearing three hours, it has so much to digest, which this second viewing will allow me to grow in my personal estimations. With that said, this feature delivers some tremendous visuals in how it frames these characters and opens a big can of worms to dissect through the narrative allowing everyone to gain such an enriching experience from it. Without a doubt, one of the essential films any cinephile should seek out and absorb because there’s so much greatness draped all over this work by Tarkovsky.
Films with Josh 
