Great, but it lacks that hypnotic feeling from the other films by Andrei

First of all, let me say that `the Sacrifce` is my favorite Tarkovsky film. Why? I don´t know, perhaps because it is the perfect movie about spirituality and the inside of the human being, in an age (our age) where those things are considered unimportant.
I think it is visually the most complete out of all his films; the dream sequences are perfectly balanced to fit the mood of the rest of the movie.
Sven Nyqvist´s camerawork is just perfect. Take the opening `Zarathustra` scene for example, oneof the most complete long shots in movie history; the way the camera starts of from a distance, and then sneaks up on the three humans without you even noticing.


Decides I admire ATs courage, his determination to peel of all unimportant cinematic tricks in order to create something worthwhile and humanistic, to tell it all without any disguises.

After thinking it over I gave the film 10/10 stars today. The final scene brings tears to my eyes.

I think it's one of his most perfect films. And like his other film, it does have a hypnotic feeling, that is very surreal.

Last Films seen:
The Sacrifice(1986)- 10/10
3:10 To Yuma(2007)- 9/10

well, now that I've tasted a bit of Tarkovsky's world I feel compelled to watch more of his films.

I haven't watched enough of them in order to qualify this movie among his best or lesser works.

For what I've seen from him, it's not as puzzling but neither as poetic as "The Mirror or Solyaris" but it's better than "Voyage in time". However as I've said before, I've to watch more of them before any judgement.

I liked it, that's for sure. But I don't got all his "hidden" messages, That's true as well.

I think there's less of it, but it's still there. Slow, beautiful, mysterious. This film has a lot character backgrounds, so they had to establish those. This was a for me a refreshing film, because it was different from all other Tarkovsky films. Wasn't it shot by Bergman's cinematographer? I felt bergman's influnce right away in the visuals and script, but andrei's films are completely his own.

Yes, I feeled the same way about this film. Though I have only seen "Zerkalo" and "Stalker", to me these films were much more dreamlike and hypnotic (as you said) than "Offret". It's still a great film though, and very appropriate for a great director's final film.

This film, along with Ivan's Childhood (Tarkovsky's first feature film), are my least favorites of his films. Does that mean The Sacrifice and Ivan's Childhood are bad films? Of course not. I agree with you that Tarkovsky's other films (especially Solaris and Stalker, my two favorites of his work) are much better, more hypnotic, and more poetic than The Sacrifice. The Sacrifice is a great film, but it was made by a master filmmaker who has made better films.

Hello guys. I opened this thread almost 2 years ago. I came across it just today and saw that some people have been replying to it in the last few days.
Wanted to share my thoughts again 2 years after posting this...

1) In my humble opinion Andrei Tarkovsky is the greatest filmmaker of all time a true genius. Like Bergman said: he lives in a realm of dremas that I have yet to achieve (i'm paraphrasing obviously, don't remember the exact quote). Tarkosvky did sculpt in time and indeed Offret is a fine example of his particular way of filmmakimg.
2) On a recent viewing my perception remained the same, but I hv to say taht my perception is completely subjective. The hypnotic feeling I refered to in the original post 2 yaers ago is quite difficult to explain and particularly extremely personal. This is the reason why I think Nostalgia is Andrei's best film. For the same reason that Offret is not a 10/10 film for me, Nostalghia is a 11/10 film for me, that strange feeeling that Andrei gets to the film, hypnotic feling that makes you almost want to stare into the screen w/out blinking.
Most of you will disagree with me when I say that Nostalghia is Andrei's best film but I hv found with various viewings with friends of his films that the feelings and perceptions of Andreis films are deeply personal and introspective for each person that views. Most people I know do recognize that Andreis films have to be among the most beautiful, poetic and haunting examples of cinema ever made, but as I was saying for each a different film is favorite or "better".
Having noticed this I realized that the hypnotic feeling I found in Zerkalo Nostalghia was different than the one in Solyaris and Stalker that wasn't the same in Andrei Rublev or Offeet.
Finally I got to say that aparently after different viewings of Andreis films I understand that his unique and very personal vision of cinema makes us each develope a differente feeling and perception regarding his films, a very subjective sense of captivity to his films... a feeling that each person finds.
Tarkovsky has accomplished something new for me, when talkig about Tarkovsky equal shares of people prefer one of his films (not like for examplee with Fellini that the bigest share of followers would go for la Notti di Cabiria or Otto e Mezzo), but among the people that prefer or name as "best" one of his films is always for different reasons. Tarkovsky's humane and poetic way of sculpting in time touches us in singular, different and most importantly personal and unique ways each.

Sorry if I said a lot and did't say anything at the same time hope you understood, and thnx for keeping this thread alive I thought it had been closed months ago...

Regards, Roberto from Costa Rica