wayvyiews -Ivan’s Childhood
In Tarkovsky’s Ivan’s Childhood, the primary focus is a boy’s function in war and how wartimes frequently tend to completely invert our expectations of what is accepted and normal. As gruesome as it is, many children become implicated in state sanctioned violence during times of war. The fact that his mother and sister died by the hands of the Nazis creates the perfect conditions for Ivan to forgo his childhood innocence and gives birth to an insatiable thirst for vengeance in Ivan. There are many scenes in which Tarkovsky pulls and pushes between the concepts of boyhood and innocence in war, for example when Colonel Gryaznov scoffs at Lieutenant Galtzev for saying that war is a place for men, not for boys, despite himself probably being closer in age to the latter, or when Ivan tries to run away to join the partisans after Gryaznov insists that he go to military school. However, the dissonance between these two ideas is depicted best in Tarkovsky’s surreal dream sequences that he employs four times throughout the movie to give the audience an insight into Ivan’s fractured psyche. In this scene analysis, I shall examine the second dream sequence that Ivan undergoes to underscore the themes of innocence, corruption, boyhood and war that are reinforced in these scenes. This scene is arguably the most important of the four that provide the structure for this film as it provides important information regarding Ivan’s state of mind and the death of his mother, which serves as his primary motivation through his journey in the film.
Ivan has just finished his scouting mission for the Russian Army. He has just been taken in, allowed to bathe and clothed by Galtsev. While he is eating his meal, Tarkovsky gives the audience their first subversion of their expectations of childhood, as Ivan eats slowly and pensively accompanied by a slow camera push in. His mannerisms more closely resemble an old man’s more closely than they do a little boy’s. This is driven home when he thanks Galtsev for the food, pushes the bowl away and begins to fall asleep on himself. The audience is then reminded that we are in fact looking at a child and not at a man as the scene fades to black and when the lights are raised, the audience is greeted by an image of Galtsev carrying a sleeping Ivan to his bed. He even goes as far as to tuck the child in, which reinforces the idea that Ivan is a child.
The movie is littered with instances where Ivan is in one moment a hardened warrior, fighting for his dead mother and for his country, and in the next he is a small boy, being held in the arms of an adult. I believe that this duality, the switch from one to the other, is how Tarkovsky sees the child’s psyche after it has been altered by war. This shot is then followed by a long shot pan of the room, starting with the fireplace and moving across the room. All the while there is the sound of water dripping. Eventually we are shown that it is water from Ivan’s fingertips falling into a bowl. This could be read as a reference to the previous dream sequence, where Ivan was shown to be dipping his hands into a bucket in front of his mother to wash his face and to drink, indicating that we are picking up where we left off from the last dream sequence.
Water is a common theme throughout every dream sequence which could be read as Ivan’s growing angst and hatred towards the Nazis. Therefore, the water droplets on his fingers could be seen as him figuratively dipping his fingers into these negative emotions, without yet allowing himself to be fully enveloped by them. The audience is then shown this impossible space, as the camera pans upwards from his hands to reveal that the camera is at the bottom of the well, with Ivan and his mother at the top of it. Tarkovsky became known for these kinds of shots, where the protagonist is both within the shot, experiencing the events of the scene but also without this context, observing oneself experiencing these events. Ivan drops a feather down the well foreshadowing the bucket that will be dropped down the well by his mother preceding her death. He comments on how deep the well is once the feather has moved out of frame. This deep well serves as a metaphor for the depth of human suffering during wartime, as well as its effects on society, social norms and Ivan’s Childhood. This is so because his mother, after treating Ivan’s statement as an obvious truth, mentions that stars are visible in deep wells such as this one, even on the brightest day. This initially confuses Ivan, but he eventually sees the star, but is still confused as to how it arrived there during the day. His mother responds that while it is daytime for them, it is nighttime for the star. This inversion of logic and reasoning is parallel what happens during war. Economies collapse, money becomes worthless and the fabric of civil society begins to unravel. This is also shown in the scene where the audience is introduced to the man whose village has burned down. He also obeys his own rules and logic that would not be permissible in normal society.
The audience then sees Ivan trying to reach the star in the well. This is representative of boyhood wonderment, play and attempting the impossible. In this moment, Ivan is still a child, unaware of the world around him and concerned only with his own merriment. Mystical bell music slowly mixes into the soundscape and the audience is exposed to the voices of German soldiers, speaking about reconnaissance around the river. The river is a central location in the film, serving as the frontline, the location for Ivan’s first mission and ultimately the last place the audience sees Ivan alive. Now, Ivan is partially submerged in the water, or the metaphor for his blinding rage as the voices of the Germans swell. The camera pans upwards once again, leaving Ivan, but at this time is tracking a bucket being hoisted by his mother. Gunshots are heard from the bottom of the well and the bucket begins careening towards the screen, followed by Ivan’s mother’s scarf, which floats down playfully. Ivan screams for his mother. This is followed by a hard cut to the top of the well, where Ivan’s mother is face down in the dirt. A slow -motion splash of water comes out of the well which can be read metaphorically as the hate that Ivan had springing forth and bursting through the surface because of his mother’s death. The literal reading of this scene is less compelling due to the physical impossibility of the bucket dropping causing that large splash.
Tarkovsky’s movies are always laced with charged images and stories, and Ivan’s Childhood is no different. Using the four dream sequences as a structure, Tarkovsky creates a masterpiece that realistically delves into the horrors of war and the adverse effects it has on children and wider society. By using his poetic metaphors such as water as well as the name Ivan, to represent the wider Russian population, Tarkovsky creates a moving tale about a lost boy thirsting for revenge. This loss of innocence is tragic, and ultimately costs Ivan his life, and the way that Tarkovsky expertly illustrates this loss and Ivan’s journey is what grants this movie the stature of masterpiece.
-Mr. D
