"The 1920s saw the rise of a few big seperate film industries," Mitchell said. He was perched on the back of his couch again, his feet on the cushions. "We'll get to the United States next week. This week, we're talking about Germany, about the Soviet Union, and how they coped after the Great War." There was almost a moment's hesitation there, on that note. "For those of you not of this time, the Great War was... epic and brutal and dragged on from 1914 till 1918, destroying lives, destroying borders, ending nationalism on piles upon piles of men who thought they were going to be heroes for their people."

He took a breath. Back to the class. "The German government banned foreign films during the first few years of the war, and that meant that until 1920, the German film industry had time to flourish within its own borders. The Germans took the blame for the war, and they paid a heavy price for it, which didn't benefit a great many people - except those who were profiting off the working class folk who wanted to spend their money before it became worthless. Film got huge."

So much for that spot of background. "The Germans came with historical epics, with stories about Anne Boleyn and Madame Dubarry. But their biggest finding was likely to be Expressionism. Expressionist film was incredibly stylised, the props, the backgrounds, they were all distorted. The biggest of them was called The Wardrobe of Professor Nasigari, which you'll be seeing here today. Expressionism was all about style, about composition and... nightmares. On the opposite end, you had Kammerspiel, which was Expressionism's exact opposite: about characters and subtlety rather than style."

He took a breath before he continued. "Further to the East, you had the USSR. Newly formed during the Bolshevik Revolution around 1917, where the Tsar was overthrown by communist leaders who wanted to put the people in charge." He fidgeted with one of his gloves for a moment. "It took a while for the Bolsheviks to get their hands on the film industry. Especially since they were still at war for the country. In 1920, they started to get a handle on things, started to promote filmmakers to get to work. Film was always an excellent propaganda tool. 'Of all the arts, for us the cinema is most important', is what Lenin, the head of state, said, and he wasn't referring to how much fun it can be to watch an action flick on a Sunday night."

"Around 1923, the Russian film industry had produced the first film that actually scored with audiences, called Red Goblins. It started building from then on in, and it became a fertile ground for loyal communists to explore their art." He'd put an emphasis on loyal on purpose, yes. "They brought to life the Montage movement. Their greatest contribution was Potjomkin, which we'll be watching today. It was shot by Sergei Eisenstein, an old theatre director who graduated to film with time. Most of the Montage films, though, were more popular abroad than they were in Russia, because the party government felt they were too complicated. The idea of Montage was that if you put together a series of exciting moments, it would arouse the viewer's emotions. They described shots as cells, and putting a movie together meant conflict, putting together two conflicting cells. Whether it be placement, light, camera direction, shots had to be in contrast to each other."

There was a pause. "Of course," he said, "Being the Soviet Union, most of these filmmakers were kicked out of the country for being disloyal eventually." He dropped his hands. "Today, I'd like you to watch these two films, and discuss the differences. They were both made in rebellion to traditional cinema, and elements from both were taken into film as most of us know it. So let's see what makes them different."