Did anyone start to crack up when Irland Josephson lit himself on fire?

I’ll admit his lighting himself on fire coupled with the dog and Ode to Joy kind of made me crack up a little, but I figured perhaps the scene was meant as satire.

Also, there were moments during Nostalghia when I felt like I was watching an Angelopoulos film.

I absolutely love ‘Nostalghia’ and I have to say that the first time I watched it, it looked very similar to the late Fellini films to me, both thematically and stylistically.
Since you wrote that it echoed the films of Theo Angelopoulos for you, I am really wondering how big was the impact of Tonino Guerra whenever he worked with these three directors (Fellini, Angelopoulos and Tarkovsky), because I am pretty sure that his approach to the story and to the director involved in each project might have strongly influenced the final product, resulting in connatural films.

How ‘bout keep spoilers out of thread titles where they can’t be avoided, mkay?

Well, to be serious, after finally seeing Voyage in Time and hearing Tarkovsky’s “unused” idea about a man who sets his wife on fire because he feels he can no longer trust her, I wondered if that idea got translated into that scene which, by the way, is one of the most startling scenes I’ve ever seen in a film.

As we left the theater, my friend proposed the title for a Tarkovsky retrospective: “Horses Setting Themselves on Fire”…at least, I think that was the proposal.

No man, I started tearing up during that scene. I thought it was pretty powerful. The only satire in the scene was the completely motionless and indifferent audience standing perfect;y still in the square.

I cracked up more when Tarkovsky fucked up his grand set piece tracking shot in The Sacrifice.

@Jerry Johnson: Which tracking shot are you referring to? And how did he mess it up?

SPOILERZ TEE HEE

Umberto, he’s referring to the penultimate shot of the movie where Erland is outside of the burning house. The first time they burnt the house down, the camera jammed and messed the shot up. It’s covered in the documentary on the special features. You can see Tarkovsky with his face in his hands, on the verge of weeping.

He convinced the producxers to give him the insane amount of money needed to quickly rebuild the house and burn it again. They obviously pulled off the shot the second time.

Thanks a lot, I wasn’t aware of that!