State Funeral

Red Square, March 9th, 1953

Sergei Loznitsa's State Funeral is an assemblage of footage documenting the prolonged funeral ceremonies held throughout the Soviet Union to mark the death of Joseph Stalin in 1953. Loznitsa, a Ukrainian director of fictional films such as Donbass, has sifted through what must have been mountains of footage of the various events, all shot beautifully in both color and black and white. The memorials for Uncle Joe ranged throughout the USSR from Lviv to Vladivostok with many wreaths, commemorative buttons, armbands, banners, flags, and 21 gun salutes on display. The racial variety of the country is exhibited, as is the universal sorrow expressed for the fallen leader. Loznitsa weaves the footage into a seamless whole sequentially like a river that flows. No narration is provided, just the sonorous sorrow of radio commentators and rally speakers. The focus is not on Stalin's legacy or his corpse, but on the Soviet people who have been hypnotized by state media into worshipping their commander.

The repetitive nature of the film may prove daunting to some. Nevertheless, this is crucial to what the film seeks to portray: how the propaganda and pageantry of state socialism, akin to that of religious rituals, work to buttress the idolatry of their leadership. Speakers on state radio stress the immortality of Stalin as Chopin's funeral march plays over and over. Of course, it is the height of irony that a social movement founded on the rejection of religion used the narcotic buzz of its rituals and pageantry to keep the masses in line. Khrushchev presides over the funeral orations at Lenin's tomb like an MC. However, this is truly a dais of the damned. All of the main speakers (Malenkov, Beria, and Molotov) would be removed from power, and in Beria's case executed, within three years. State Funeral is currently streaming on MUBI. It is one of the more powerful documentaries released in the current century.

Lest we forget: Picasso's memorial tribute to Stalin

Andrey Sinyavsky was in his parents' apartment when he heard the news. Everyone broke down and started to howl, except for Sinyavsky and a friend whose eye he caught. They moved unobtrusively to another room, locked the door and danced in silent celebration.

Alex De Jonge, Stalin, pg. 481.