Jeremy Hicks demonstrates how Vertov draws on Soviet journalistic models for his transformation of newsreel into the new form of documentary film. Through analyses of Cine-Pravda No 21 (Leninist Cine-Pravda), Cine-Eye, Forward Soviet!,A Sixth Part of the Earth, The Eleventh Year, Man with a Movie Camera, Enthusiasm, Three Songs of Lenin, and Lullaby, he shows how Vertov's greatest works combine authentic documentary footage ingeniously for tremendous rhetorical effect.
Today, with the energetic revival of interest in documentary film, Vertov's reflexive and overtly partisan films are of great relevance; but they need to be better known and understood. This is the purpose of Dziga Vertov Â- Defining Documentary Film.« less