''Mechanics of the Brain'' (russian: Механика головного мозга, Myekhanika golovnogo mozga) is a 1926

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...

documentary film A documentary film or documentary is a non-fictional film, motion-picture intended to "document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education or maintaining a Recorded history, historical record". Bill Nichols (film critic), Bil ...

directed by

Vsevolod Pudovkin Vsevolod Illarionovich Pudovkin ( rus, Всеволод Илларионович Пудовкин, p=ˈfsʲevələt ɪlərʲɪˈonəvʲɪtɕ pʊˈdofkʲɪn; 16 February 1893 – 30 June 1953) was a Russian and Soviet film director, screenwriter ...

, a popularization of

Ivan Pavlov Ivan Petrovich Pavlov ( rus, Ива́н Петро́вич Па́влов, , p=ɪˈvan pʲɪˈtrovʲɪtɕ ˈpavləf, a=Ru-Ivan_Petrovich_Pavlov.ogg; 27 February 1936), was a Russian and Soviet experimental neurologist, psychologist and physiol ...

's studies in

classical conditioning Classical conditioning (also known as Pavlovian or respondent conditioning) is a behavioral procedure in which a biologically potent stimulus (e.g. food) is paired with a previously neutral stimulus (e.g. a triangle). It also refers to the learni ...

. The picture is considered the first Russian popular science film. The motion picture is the first independent work of Pudovkin as a director and also marks the start of his collaboration with cinematographer Anatoli Golovnya. Pudovkin joined Mezhrabpom-Rus film studio in 1925 and, as his first job, was assigned to make a popular science film about Ivan Pavlov's work. The filming started in May 1925 and proceeded for more than a year. The many delays were caused by constant shuttling between the Pavlov's laboratory in Leningrad and the film studio in Moscow as well as difficulties with filming conditioned animals who were easily distracted by the lights and sounds of filming process. The film depicts Pavlov's experiments on both animals and orphans, by a variety of methods, one of which was to implement a device to collect saliva into the orphans cheek. Twenty years later, Pudovkin told an interviewer:

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* Soviet documentary films Gorky Film Studio films Soviet silent feature films Soviet black-and-white films Films directed by Vsevolod Pudovkin 1926 documentary films 1926 films Black-and-white documentary films Documentary films about psychology Soviet popular science films {{sci-documentary-film-stub