Based roughly on brothers Arkady and Boris Strugatsky’s novel Roadside Picnic, Tarkovsky’s vision in Stalker discards the book’s explicit regard to extra-terrestrial influence.
The film follows three men – a writer, a scientist, and their guide the Stalker – as they venture into a heavily fortified zone in search of a mysterious room that’s said to carry whatever one most deeply desires. Entry into the zone is forbidden, and therefore the imposing militarised fenceline surrounding it, also because the Stalker’s deformed child, sugge...
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