The Russian Ark by Aleksandr Sokurov is an amazing accomplishment for the film industry. It was the first film to be shot in one single take that lasted for ninety-six minutes. What I especially liked about Russian Ark is the history that is told in the film. Since the whole thing was done in the Hermitage Museum, I liked how the European flowed through the “halls of time” experiencing the greatness of Russia. That being said, I had a hard time following the film. Throughout the whole film, the European wanders through the museum which in the film is the Winter Ball. Not only does the film organize itself around the ball, it also shows different time periods of Russian history. I liked how we never met the narrator of the film but only relied on the European to show us around the Ball. He being a world traveler tied in to the fact that he is time traveling Russia. At the very end of the film, the narrator looked out of one of the windows and saw the ocean. I thought it was interesting how they tied the flow of history to an ark that holds Russia’s culture. It seems that it is saying that no matter what Russia had to go through; the 900 day siege, the days of Catherine the Great, the not so great times with Joseph Stalin; they stuck or sailed together However, as much as I liked the different time periods that were depicted, the colors, and music and dresses and the idea of a film with one single shot, I found that I was rather bored with the whole film. Like I said, as awesome as it is that the film was in a single shot, I thought that it didn’t work. In my opinion I found that it made the film a little slow and without any cuts or transitions it dragged on for me.