“This is the Zone. It might seem capricious, but at each moment, it’s as if we construct it according to our state of mind.”
Preserved within the sci-fi drama Stalker — between its elliptical cuts that bend space, and in its looming, lengthy takes that extend time — is the very essence of its director, Andrei Tarkovsky. The late Soviet filmmaker has long been hailed as one of the all-time greats, a cinematic poet and philosopher whose thoughts on the medium helped expand our understanding of its capabilities. There is perhaps no greater compendium of his artistic worldview than the eerie and deeply spiritual sci-fi masterpiece that might have slain him.
