Page - 47 - in JRFM - Journal Religion Film Media, Volume 06/01

to the aesthetic expression of Christology. In Stalker this Christological imagery finds expression again, this time through a variety of visuals and character motifs. The most striking of these visuals is delivered in the second of the Stalker’s se- pia-lensed dreams, when one remarkable tracking shot passes over a shallow pool of water. Collected beneath the surface are the detritus of long-lost years: a steel tray; a painting of some trees; discarded syringes juxtaposed with the astounding visual of a fragment of the Ghent Altarpiece, glassing the image of John the Baptist (see fig. 4). Fish swim among the strange accumulation, “a symbol for the Christ who has been with the Stalker both night and day”.15 Interestingly, this dream-image of water, altarpiece, and symbolic fish is accompanied by a voiceover from Revelation 6:13–17, which picks up on the eschatological tremors reverberating through the narrative. The dream sequence, then, resonates with the apocalyptic vision as the sixth seal is opened in these verses, making the eschatological significance of the Zone unavoidable. Tarkovsky’s Christological imagery is always situated, however, within a wider Trinitarian range of visuals. The film’s motifs, which are not always explicitly the- 15 Turovskaya 1989, 113. Fig. 4: Film still “The Ghent Altarpiece”, Stalker (Andrei Tarkovsky, USSR 1979), 01:26:37. 46 | James Lorenz www.jrfm.eu 2020, 6/1, 37–52