[1] Directed and co-written by Sergei Eisenstein, it presents a dramatization of the mutiny that occurred in 1905 when the crew of the Russian battleship Potemkin rebelled against their officers.

[2][3][4] In the most recent Sight and Sound critics' poll in 2022, it was voted the fifty-fourth-greatest film of all time, and it had been placed in the top 10 in many previous editions.

Eisenstein divided the plot into five acts, each with its own title: The scene begins with two sailors, Matyushenko and Vakulinchuk, discussing the need for the crew of the Potemkin, which is anchored off the island of Tendra, to support the revolution then taking place within Russia.

Vakulinchuk's body is taken ashore and displayed publicly by his companions in a tent with a sign on his chest that says "For a spoonful of borscht" (Изъ-за ложки борща).

Suddenly a detachment of dismounted Cossacks form battle lines at the top of the steps and march toward a crowd of unarmed civilians including women and children, and begin firing and advancing with fixed bayonets.

Every now and again, the soldiers halt to fire a volley into the crowd before continuing their impersonal, machine-like assault down the stairs, ignoring the people's pleas.

Brief sequences show individuals among the people fleeing or falling, a baby carriage rolling down the steps, a woman shot in the face, broken glasses, and the high boots of the soldiers moving in unison.

[6] In retaliation, the sailors of the Potemkin use the guns of the battleship to fire on the city opera house, where Tsarist military leaders are convening a meeting.

The sailors of the Potemkin decide to take the battleship out from the port of Odessa to face the fleet of the Tsar, flying the red flag along with the signal "Join us".

Just when battle seems inevitable, the sailors of the Tsarist squadron refuse to open fire, cheering and shouting to show solidarity with the mutineers and allowing the Potemkin to pass between their ships.

On the 20th anniversary of the first Russian revolution, the commemorative commission of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee decided to stage a number of performances dedicated to the revolutionary events of 1905.

[8] In the original script, the film was to highlight a number of episodes from the 1905 revolution: the Russo-Japanese War, Armenian–Tatar massacres of 1905–1907, revolutionary events in St. Petersburg and the Moscow uprising.

In 1925, after sale of the film's negatives to Germany and reediting by director Phil Jutzi, Battleship Potemkin was released internationally in a different version from that originally intended.

[16] The battleship Kniaz Potemkin Tarritcheski, later renamed Panteleimon and then Boretz Za Svobodu, was derelict and in the process of being scrapped at the time of the film shoot.

Eisenstein hand-tinted the flag in red in 108 frames for the premiere at the Grand Theatre, which was greeted with thunderous applause by the Bolshevik audience.

These statues were modeled after the Medici Lions of Renaissance Italy, linking classical art to the film's modern revolutionary themes.

[21] Eisenstein's experiment was a mixed success; he "was disappointed when Potemkin failed to attract masses of viewers",[22] but the film was also released in a number of international venues, where audiences responded positively.

In both the Soviet Union and overseas, the film shocked audiences, but not so much for its political statements as for its use of violence, which was considered graphic by the standards of the time.

[27] The film was not banned in Nazi Germany, although Heinrich Himmler issued a directive prohibiting SS members from attending screenings, as he deemed the movie inappropriate for the troops.

[25] The film was eventually banned in some countries, including the United States and France for a time, as well as in its native Soviet Union.

[30][31] In the scene, the Tsar's soldiers in their white summer tunics march down a seemingly endless flight of steps in a rhythmic, machine-like fashion, firing volleys into a crowd.

The victims include an older woman wearing pince-nez, a young boy with his mother, a student in uniform and a teenage schoolgirl.

The massacre on the steps, although it did not take place in daylight[32] or as portrayed,[33] was based on the fact that there were widespread riots in other parts of the city, sparked off by the arrival of the Potemkin in Odessa Harbour.

The previous English intertitles, which had toned down the mutinous sailors' revolutionary rhetoric, were corrected so that they would now be an accurate translation of the original Russian titles.

In commercial format, on DVD for example, the film is usually accompanied by classical music added for the "50th anniversary edition" released in 1975.

A version of the film offered by the Internet Archive has a soundtrack that also makes heavy use of the symphonies of Shostakovich, including his Fourth, Fifth, Eighth, Tenth, and Eleventh.

In an attempt to make the film relevant to the 21st century, Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe (of the Pet Shop Boys) composed a soundtrack in 2004 with the Dresden Symphonic Orchestra.

The entire film was digitally restored to a sharper image by Gianluca Missero (who records under the name Hox Vox).

The Berklee Silent Film Orchestra also composed a new score for the film in 2011, and performed it live to picture at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, in Washington, D.C. A new electroacoustic score by the composers collective Edison Studio was first performed live in Naples at Cinema Astra for Scarlatti Contemporanea Festival on 25 October 2017 [56] and published on DVD [57] in 5.1 surround sound by Cineteca di Bologna in the "L'Immagine Ritrovata" series, along with a second audio track with a recording of the Meisel's score conducted by Helmut Imig.

The site's consensus reads, "A technical masterpiece, Battleship Potemkin is Soviet cinema at its finest, and its montage editing techniques remain influential to this day.