Drawn from a vast archive of official footage produced under the regime of Albanian strongman Enver Hoxha, Rolando Seiko’s documentary A State Film is a fascinating study in the power of images and myth.
It was screened in the main competition of Ji.hlava Intl, the Czech Republic’s main annual non-fiction film event. Documentary film festivals are carefully constructed compilations of images for the masses, and there’s a lot to unpack, Sejko says.
“I have been working on propaganda film archives for several years now, first with Istituto Luce Cinecittà and then also with the archives of the communist regime in Albania,” Seiko says. “Both contain thousands of films created to build political narratives, often with impressive cinematic ambitions.”
This is the genre that Seiko explored in her previous film, Alfredo C.’s Image Machine, which was screened at the Venice Film Festival in 2021. The film tells the true story of the Istituto Luce cameramen who photographed Mussolini and fascist propaganda, and ultimately the leader of Communist Albania.
“This was a hybrid film, but during production we realized that Albania’s vast film archive and the central figure of Enver Hoxha were not being told in their own image alone.”
There, as a professional archivist and head of Italy’s Cinecittà Luce editorial department, Seiko set out to analyze and curate decades of state propaganda films.
“Albanian propaganda newsreels and documentaries clearly bear traces of Eastern Bloc cinematography,” Seiko says. “The first Albanian photographers were trained by the Soviet masters, starting with Roman Carmen, the legendary chronicler of revolution and war.”
“There was never a manual for propaganda photographers, no rule book on how to photograph the regime, and yet something invisible controlled their images. The May 1st parade photographed in communist Albania bears a striking resemblance to those photographed in Moscow, Bucharest, or Sofia in the same year.”
Indeed, the images of cheering worker heroes and dancing girls in traditional folk costumes seen in A State Film are hauntingly familiar.
The footage, which urged Albanians to “obey and carry out the laws of their government” in honor of the bloody sacrifices of their heroes after World War II, reveals Hoxha’s devotion to Stalin and Yugoslav dictator Josip Broz Tito.
Oversized portraits of all three are dragged down the endless streets as crowds of adoring fans parade with wheelbarrows, shovels and carbines. Praise for industry is being sung while Hoxha’s hundreds of thousands of defense bunkers have withstood test blasts, proving their readiness to stand up to decadent imperialist forces from the West.
A dog and a guinea pig are sacrificed, presumably to test the possibility of a gas attack.
And all the while, there’s always another inspiring patriotic song for farmers to sing.
“It’s not just the photographer’s technique that creates this similarity,” Sejko says. “It is a vision of the world presented, always the same choreography of collective joy.”
That being said, when audiences watch “A State Film,” they begin to realize that the images are distilled in some way. And you might notice a soundtrack that replaces the original’s heavy-handed narration with rustling trees, chirping birds, and the crunch of feet on a dirt road.
“In official propaganda films such as newsreels, documentaries, and parades, the narrator’s voice was prescriptive rather than descriptive. It told the viewer what to think. To replace it with another commentary (even a critical one) would mean repeating the same mechanism.”
“So we removed not just the voices, but the entire original soundtrack, leaving only the real things: applause, singing, and speech. We built a new, realistic soundscape, including footsteps, murmurs, creaks, and silences, as if the scene had been recorded live. This new texture restores the physicality of the image and opens up a space where sound itself becomes a narrative tool.”
A striking contrast emerges when this is intercut with footage from Hoxha’s personal archive, showing moments away from the cheering masses and featuring a drive in the dictator’s favorite black Mercedes, always a favorite of the dictator.
According to Seiko, these motifs have symbolic value, suggesting the loneliness and isolation of power. A State Film raises questions about how forms of propaganda have changed, while also forcing an uncomfortable realization of how many classic tropes are still being deployed today.
“A State Film” has been described as demonstrating that “archives are not just repositories of images, but tools for interpreting and rewriting history.”
Indeed, the carefully staged parade of horrifying scenes seems to go beyond the framework of national history and, as the director says, explores the function of images in the political realm and their ability to create collective memory.
