Personally, for me, the Man with the movie camera was an elaborately created film.The details in the montages Vertov creates is what really resonates. Take for instance the cut to a birds eye view of a field, and the geometric shapes that it creates and then juxtapose it next to a close up of the revolving door. At a glance these two shots don't really elicit any thought or feeling but at a closer look you realize these two completely unrelated images are in fact identical. I think that kind of take and uniqueness on a montage is what sets the film apart. Another example could be the silent language Vertov is speaking. He cuts back and forth between a woman, and homeless people sleeping, and then to a movie poster of a man with a finger over his lips 'shhhhhing' the audience if you will. I mean the whole film is revolved around these cuts and the list is endless but I think the one that stuck out the most, for me at least, would have to be the the cut of a camera man, riding a motorcycle and shooting, then it's cut to the audience, from the beginning of the film, watching the cut we just watched. Vertov intertwined the making of the movie, to us seeing the making of the movie, to the audience watching the movie and us watching the theatre watch the movie we watched being created.
Vertov also created montages with idealogical views. He cuts between mindless activities like getting a shave to labor necessities like sharpening an axe; from a woman being pampered and getting her nails done to a woman working intently with those "same" hands.
Vertov takes everyday frivolous activities and productive labor and creates a web entwining the two. The Man with the movie camera is nothing short of genius.
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