Siberia, 1917
My father had been an exile to Siberia for life.
But history was changing his sentence.
Russia was in its third year of a bloody war against Germany.
The Tsar had lost so many men that he needed even his enemies to fight for him.
But my father wasn't good enough.
Josef Visarionovich Djugashvili, age 38,
born in Gori in the province of Georgia.
Exiled to Siberia
for revolutionary activities.
Nevertheless, subject to conscription into the imperial army.
Conscript has the following deformities:
Left arm
two inches shorter than right arm.
Possibly a congenital defect.
Second and third toes of left foot:
webbed and joined.
The mark of the devil.
Rejected!
My father robbed banks to raise money
for the outlawed Bolshevik Party.
His favorite alias was Koba.
He hunted during the day and at night
he played cards with cut-throats and thieves.
Our people were starving.
They blamed the Tsar.
And he was forced to abdicate.
The new government freed all political prisoners.
And exiled revolutionaries like my father were granted amnesty.
The rich and the nobility fled.
Koba was going home.
So was Lenin,
the leader of the Bolshevik party - my father's idol.
HBO Pictures Presents
A Mark Carliner Production
A film by Ivan Passer
Robert Duvall
There's Lenin, Koba, Lenin!
- STALIN - _________
Koba! Koba!
Julia Ormond
Sergei!
Most of the old friends were there - like Sergei and Olga Alliluyev.
Olga! - Oh, such a long time.
And... Nadya.
Little Nadya!
Hey! Why aren't you there with them?
I'll see him tomorrow.
Nadya was to become my mother.
Olga, what the... she's a woman!
Not yet... Not Yet!
Comrades! Soldiers, Workers, Sailors!
I thank you for the overthrowing the Tsar.
But the Great War still continues.
Did you overthrow the Tsar to continue his bloody war?
No-o-o!
Did you overthrow the Tsar so the peasants would remain landless?
No-o-o!
Did you overthrow the Tsar so the workers and their families
would continue to starve?
No-o-o!
The people demand peace! Now!
The people demand bread. Now!
The people demand land. Now!
Towards the unfinished revolution!
The proletarian revolution!
It took the Bolshevik six more months to finish the revolution
and set up the communist government.
No-one was allowed to own anything.
The Tsar and his family were executed.
And a new war broke out. Civil war.
Casting by Joyce Nettles
Music by Stanislas Syrewicz
Edited by Peter Davies
Koba's favorite song. Let's play that.
You remember?
I've remembered everything you've told me about him.
And I remember how he saved my life when I was drowning in the Black Sea.
You were not drowning, you were playing in the water...
he waded in picked you up and he brought you back to us.
I was chocking water and he swam to save me.
You were three years old! - I remember!
Line producer Don West
"Black Swallow. " - Nadya's record.
She's how old now? - Seventeen. That dedicated.
She could discuss theory with Lenin. - That I like to hear.
Written by Paul Monash
So Koba... - No... Stalin.
Stalin? - My new name.
Steel? - Steel.
But for you old friend, and friends and comrades like you
I'm always Koba.
To Stalin! - No. To Lenin!
Directed by Ivan Passer
?Subtitles made by TheDoubleXer ?/b>
Nadya became one of Lenin's secretaries.
A year later she joined Stalin
who was sent to the southern front.
Just leave you take it to the secretariat - was that your own idea?
What did you say? What?
With that civil war I said maybe I could be more useful.
Useful... ? Useful... ?!
Braided deep to Stalin. For watching him,
reporting on him?
No, helping him.
So, that is - Stalin needs help; Stalin needs help
from a nineteen-year-girl?
To assist you, to take notes. - Who for?
Who taught you to watch Stalin? Who?
Was it Trotsky? Or Lenin?
Nadya thought Stalin was going to change Russia.
She was right.
Do you have a notebook? Not yet - take this. And the pencil here.
Ready? - Yes.
Write!
In this compartment Stalin told me he would do anything and everything
to stabilize the southern front.
He would take measures - stern measures.
But... they said that you were only to collect grain...
not get involved in military activities.
Stalin does not obey orders unless he agrees with them.
You always become the leader. - Not always, not.
Yes!
Always my father says.
You want things your way and you get them.
What else does he say?
You're a hero.
You organized daring robberies, escapes from prisons.
You are a giant among pigmies.
I am a small humble man, the son of a cobbler
and an illiterate washer woman.
The rose bud opens, blue bows all around...
The larch flew higher, the nightingale sings so fine...
{ I was fifteen... }
Look at you - an army commander!
Look at you, commissar of nationalities.
Chosen by Lenin himself.
Klim Voroshilov, this is Nadya Alliluyeva,
Sergei's daughter.
You have your mother's eyes.
A Bolshevik aristocrat, ha?!
Filipov. Kavelenko. Tsarist officers. - Yes.
Do you trust them?
Trotsky does, do you? - Trotsky is a war commissar,
and he's the commander of the Red Army.
You disagree with Trotsky or not?
Not exactly!
Good!
Then you agree to the need for vigilance?
Yes, absolutely! Resolute vigilance!
Here's a list of unreliable officers.
I want them to be summoned here immediately.
Trotsky should be informed. - Trotsky does not understand!
We do.
All the officers on your list are here,
as you requested, Koba!
Why? What's the reason?
Because I fought for you, bastards!
This barge was not sunk, Klim.
Be very careful.
They'll all be lost. Be very, very careful.
"24 former Tsarist officers suspected of treason
have drowned...
Unfortunate accident.
Replacing them with reliable elements. "
No, that's murder!
Murder, murder... He says - an accident.
The officers were being held on a barge, and the barge sank.
And who put them on the barge? Irreplaceable professional officers...
And who killed them?
Stalin!
I demand his immediate recall!
Stalin is a trusted comrade.
Replace him, or I resign.
With Trotsky or Stalin.
Trotsky or Stalin?
You don't understand - it must be Trotsky AND Stalin.
We need you BOTH!
Trotsky never forgave my father.
They avoided each other. Even when living in the Kremlin apartments
with the rest of the party leaders.
The Kremlin April 1919
It was there my parents celebrated their wedding.
Look! You're still so young!
You were younger than me when you ran away with papa.
So I was but you should've seen your papa:
He was so handsome! An idealistic young revolutionary.
Exactly like Koba.
No, Koba's not like your papa.
You think he's too old?
He's a Georgian. I know Georgian men. But you?!
I know: you don't approve.
But I want to be with him.
Feel happy for me.
For us.
Nadya, Nadya. Nadenka.
Koba is... here looking for you.
She isn't that far away!
Joy, eternal joy!
So mashed, though.
Our revolution is so young you both triumph.
Nikolai, always an optimist. - Yes, yes!
An inclination to look on the brite side of things...
somethig you want I share.
French champagne,
liberated from prince Volkonsky cell.
Nikolai, you do the honors! - Gregory Zinoviev.
Nadya. - Grisha.
Unfortunately we couldn't liberate Volkonsky's crystal...
Smashed!
To life! - To life!
Where're you going? - Trotsky...
Kamenev and Zinoviev were intellectuals.
My father didn't have their education or their manners.
They looked down on him and he knew it.
They were on Trotsky's side.
Trotsky was the son of a prosperous land owner
who'd enjoyed all the privileges of wealth
and was looked upon by many as Lenin's era -
apparent.
French novel?
There's a better story in Bucharin's apartment.
"The mountaineer" and Nadya Alliluyeva have got married.
How was it you weren't invited?
Anything else? - No.
Go right into the secretariat.
Just the same, you come to work tomorrow.
The revolution demands it!
She'll be there. But not early.
The Kremlin April 1922
My mother was very much the new soviet woman:
she continued to work even after she was pregnant.
Comrades.
Are you going to stop making history because
no-one is here to record it?
Don't worry. It won't be written anyway.
Comrades, we have an one-point agenda today:
the secretariat - how can we improve its work?
What's wrong with its work?
It's function is growing faster than its structure.
It's the practical problem of party organization:
dues, assignment of personal membership...
its those that put devils on the secretariat that have to deal with these things.
All we have at ease is on the Politburo.
All we have to do is Think.
I think we should assign one of ourselves to the secretariat...
As a...
General Secretary.
That way we have a direct organizational link.
What about you, comrade Trotsky?
Don't settle me with that job.
Settle a mule. Settle Stalin.
Please, please! No personal remarks.
Comrade Zinoviev? Are you interested?
I nominee Stalin. - Stalin.
Yes, Stalin.
You accept, comrade Stalin?
If no-one would do it, I would do it. Yes. Thank you very much.
May I change the subject, comrade Lenin? - Please do!
The wars are behind us, we're in a new period now.
The police are supposed to be accountable.
But they still do what they like; they still terrorize people.
True! - I think comrade Bukharin is right.
No brutality should be allowed.
Although, there's no revolution possible
without terror.
What're you drawing there?
A little drawing.
They handed all this power, Sergo.
Control of all the levers!
They not even know what they're doing, stupid bastards!
Trotsky: Trotsky turns it down,
king of the Jews turns it down.
You know what they've given me - a reward for doing the job... ?
A country house.
You know who'd belonged to the house?
Zuvalov. - Zubalov?
The bastard we organized the strike against.
And Trotsky turns it down...
How is she? She - all right?
Men!
How would you like to go back to Georgia, Sergo?
They knock a new hedge together. - Whose?
Some of our old friends down there...
they're running the place as though they own it.
They need a real kick in their ass!
So, will you go. You'll go.
All you need - a good pair of boots.
Feel there! Go ahead, feel it, nice!
I could have been making these if my father had his way.
But was I nine.
He took me down to Tbilisi to make me work in a boot factory;
wanted me to be a cobbler like him.
I ran away, came home - nine years old.
He beat the shit out of me. Beat the shit out of me.
But! I've never made a boot for anyone.
No. I won.
And you know to wrest in them, Sergo?
When you wear boots you kick the man in their head.
And you never find his teeth.
Wear boots, Sergo. Wear boots.
A healthy boy!
There's a boy.
Vasily. We'll call you Vasily.
Koba! Where's Koba? Where's he?
What is the matter?
Koba!
Koba! It's Lenin:
Lenin has had a stroke.
May I talk to him?
Since when do you ask permission?
Vladimir Ilyich!
Who authorized you to send this telegraph? - What?
To Sergo Ordzhonikidze: "Of the General Secretary"?
Who's made the copy?
"You will thoroughly punish
the following members of the Georgian central committee:... "
Where did you get that?
I know they got into an argument but he slapped the man.
A leading comrade - he struck him!
The man insulted Sergo!
A party member does not strike a party member!
It is not permissible!
You're in pain?
No-no, it's nothing. It's nothing.
You will order Sergo to apologize.
He's a Georgian. He... he's...
I'm referring this to the control commission!
Who gave you this telegram? Who, who? Who told you this?
Just order Sergo to come back. Immediately!
Comrade... - Immediately!
What they are doing these boys?
They want to turn you against me; they want to split the party.
The doctors have told you to rest, to remain calm, calm.
Now why do they excite you, these bastards, why?
To kill you, that's the reason!
We will not allow this; I've one aim, one mission:
to get comrade Lenin back on his feet.
And able to lead us again.
I'll send for the doctors.
The job nobody wanted put my father
in charge of the party security.
He surrounded himself with ruthless men and pecked for their loyalty to him.
Kaganovich was one of them.
Natasha is at Lenin switch-board.
We will know about everyone who calls.
Who set this up? - I myself!
Who else knows about it? - No-one.
Make sure!
You know Koba, while Lenin is ill... - The country needs a leadership.
And Trotsky, of course, is ready to provide one.
Lenin knows so, of course, and he will never listen to anyone else's opinion.
Yours especially! - Not even ours.
We have been thinking: until Lenin can return...
Restored health and vigorous, enabled to deal with all our terrible problems...
We could lead. - In the spirit of Lenin, of course!
We? - Comrades Stalin, Kamenev and Zinoviev.
How many legs does a stool have?
Why?... - Three.
Because it cannot stand on one or two. - Good, good! - Good!
What are they plotting now? - Let them take me for a fool.
Trotsky!
Comrade Trotsky, Lenin wants to see you. - Good.
He says you must turn against Stalin before it is too late.
You must help Lenin now! - It's good. Tomorrow.
Where's he? - He's not to be disturbed!
How're you doing?
I'm just reading... I'm reading my essays from 1903.
They came out again.
It's very interesting to see it now how stupid we were at that time.
Is those officials?
Yes. I'm reading official reports.
The doctors have...
I'm responsible to you - they're, too, won't you see?
Organizationally - yes, but medically...
It's you they worry about. They do not want you burdened.
Burdened? Is it a burden to reed newspapers?
To even talk politics?
A newspaper?
Yes. Real newspapers,
not the kind you have printed for me:
one single copy for Lenin, single copies full of good news.
What a waste of money just to keep me out of politics!
It's to help your recovery.
No, to keep me out of politics. - No.
So, ... I'm not to know what's going on in our country.
I'm forbidden to read our own newspapers.
Let's comrade Lenin read your fairy-tales.
What nonsense, what Damn... nonsense!
No, it’s to speed your recovery, we need your recovery.
We need comrade Lenin's leadership.
How can comrade Lenin lead,
if he's denied information?
Politics... doctors ordered...
Doctors orders?
Not Stalin's orders? - No.
The situation in Georgia, you are a Georgian, you... you...
There's nothing to worry about... we need your health.
The re... rev... The rev... v-v-v...
Why did you call Trotsky, you stupid bitch! Didn't you think I would know?
He's not to meet with Trotsky or anybody!
What're you trying to do, to kill him? Bitch!
January 21, 1924
Lenin's dead!
My father understood how much the Russian soul craved the God.
Now that religion was illegal,
it was his idea to embalm Lenin
and have him placed on a permanent display in Red Square.
Comrade Molotov, where's comrade Trotsky?
You were instructed to... to find him and bring him here.
What happened?
I did reach him. I...
I told him the funeral was yesterday.
He was too far away to make it yesterday.
You lied to him, why?
You told me.
You didn't want to have him here.
You were to admit that to no-one - true or false?
True.
Then why are you telling it to me?
You're a real idiot, Molotov.
You will go far...
Leaving us,
comrade Lenin has ordered us to
hold high and keep pure...
the great calling of our party.
Leaving us, comrade Lenin is enjoining those
who keep the unity of our party!
Together we vow
to keep the honorable commandment, comrade Lenin!
We had an argument this morning.
About what? - Nikolai.
Bukharin? But he likes Bukharin?!
Nikolai offered me a job on a new publication:
"Revolution and culture. "
Josef says: "The next thing would be spending all your time
with Bukharin's bunch of bohemians, useless poets, artists. "
And you said they're not useless. - I said they're far from useless.
That the revolution needs culture. - Exactly.
Then I put my arms around him and then he apologized.
Then you made love?
It's this so terrible business of Lenin's death.
What's going to happen now, who's going to lead?
Josef says there's sneaking behind his back, conspiring...
Who?
I'm to get started, Zina.
Da.
Da!
Beautiful flowers.
Their life is too short.
What is it?
The telephone called - another letter... - What letter?
A letter, that Lenin sent to the central committee
to be opened after his death.
What does it say?
You know nothing about?
No, nothing.
You worked to Lenin. You were close to him.
You heard no-one talking about it?
No.
You, sneak!
I know nothing about it.
Josef!
They got it to the bitch Krupskaya.
Trotsky.
Yes: Trotsky, Kamenev, Zinoviev...
The three little weasels!
Don't say that!
Mice.
But the Georgian cat can make a deal with them and then...
Comrade Lenin also wrote:
"Stalin is too rude
and his fault becomes intolerable
in one who holds the office of General Secretary.
Therefore, I propose to the comrades
to consider a means of removing Stalin from the post
and appointing another person:
more patient, more loyal, more attentive... "
No!... - I'm the less...
No! Trotsky... - Let Trotsky speak...
This is the end of Stalin...
Let Trotsky speak...
Talk to them! You're the only one who can rid us of Stalin.
Let's Zinoviev deliver the blow.
Please, please!
For all of us Lenin's words have special meaning in a way.
But in the long period when comrade Lenin was unable to lead
it fell upon us: comrades Kamenev, Zinoviev and Stalin -
to provide collective leadership.
Our experience makes me happy to say
that comrade Lenin's apprehensions are not well-founded.
So, I propose to maintain Stalin in his post.
This is an outrage!
Lenin was ill. - Comrade Zinoviev, ...
Lenin was right! - We should listen to Lenin!
Let's Trotsky speak!
Let us agree that Lenin did write those words...
He betrayed you!
Yes, comrades, I am rude to those who wreaked and split the party
and I have never conceal this and I DO not conceal it now.
Not to be gentle is better than...
it is not really to be like... Krupskaya.
I am not free to desert my post.
Twice! Twice I try to resign
and twice I was told to remain at my post.
I obey the party. It is my obligation
that I remain at my post.
Trotsky wasted his last chance to stop my father.
He underestimated the man who he called: "The Mule" and "The Mountaineer. "
I'm Yakov.
Your son. - I know.
Why do you come here? - He's come to Moscow, to study.
It's... it's better here than Tbilisi - to the schools, I mean.
What you're asking me: you think you can just walk in here?
Get out! Go! Out! Go! - I've given your son our spare room.
No, no! You... don't worry.
He'll be all-right.
Why, Josef? Why?
You never even told me you had a son, why?
When his mother died he was two months old - you haven't seen him since, why?
Did you hate her? - No.
Have you loved her? - She was a young Georgian woman,
uneducated, religious. - How far you didn't love her?
She was young, I was young... - You've never even talked about her!
She's dead, Nadya. - Oh! The door is shut, the room is sealed!?
And you never thought about her? - Dead is dead.
And if I die?
Don't say that. - If I die would you abandon Vasily?
I didn't abandon Yakov; I left him with his sisters.
Who would you leave Vasily with?
Want you other child?
What other child?
The one I'm caring, I'm pregnant!
You are pregnant; you - pregnant?
Why didn't you tell me, why? - I made sure today.
Let Yakov stay!
Josef.
Josef!
Look at them conspiring.
They play Trotsky against me and me against Trotsky.
They thing they'll climb upon top.
I'll strike first.
Comrades, who do you thing is shipping off?
It's Trotsky, Lenin's friend!
My father! Comrades, stop them!
No! It's Trotsky, Lenin's friend!
He is my father! I can't believe this!
No! Don't take him! Why is taht? No-o-o!
He fought against the imperial army...
In 1801 Alexander I outlawed the use of torture.
"The very word "Torture", " he said, "is a disgrace to human race. "
Disgrace.
I'm helping Yakov prepare for his exams.
You agree with Alexander?
Your opinion, brilliant student!
You agree or not?
A little discussion.
Let us say that you are an army commander:
It'll never happen, of course, but let us say it...
They bring you a prisoner who has vital information
that could save the lives of your...
your command...
He's stubborn, he... he won't talk.
He spits in your face.
What you would do, Yakov? - I... I don't know.
You let your men die? - No?
Yakov,
how do you save them, huh?
I...
Torture is wrong!
My son!?
And you're trying to... to educate this hopeless idiot?
It's a... a copy of Lenin's testament, er, as they call it.
Printed in large numbers by a secret press in Leningrad.
"Stalin is too rude. "
And what a role does Zinoviev play in this matter?
Zinoviev?
He's a party boss - do you thing this could happen without his complicity?
I think he's on your side. He supported you against Trotsky.
A temporary maneuver.
Sergo, I think you could go to Leningrad.
May be you could persuade the comrades there to get rid of Zinoviev.
Find a replacement... a good communists,
attractive personality, ...
but... who, ... who could we get?
Kirov? - Kirov.
You worded with him in the Caucasus? -Yes, he really shoves things up.
A good man, people like him. Reads books, likes music, ...
a well rounded fellow.
It's very good, Sergo, very good. Why didn't I think of him? Very good.
Comrade Kirov! - Comrade Kirov?
Good.
Comrades! Sergo!
What do you got? What is this? What?
You killed it yourself, huh? - A single shot.
How far? - 10 meters.
No - wait, wait! You stood 10 m away from this?
I don't believe that.
Who could do it, I mean, Who could do it?
Could you do it, Iron Pants?|
Wouldn't be iron your pants, would it?
You're going to Leningrad to replace Zinoviev.
Sergo's going, too, and Kaganovich.
I'm counting on you!
10 meters!
He shot this from 10 m, Yagoda.
10 meters! Who could believe that?
Don't you admire a man like that? And watch him.
Go to Leningrad and keep an eye on them. Especially, ... especially Kirov.
Yes.
January 1928
My parents, my brother Vasily and I were on our way south to our winter home.
We stopped at station after station
so that my father could flex
the party muscle for local officials
who have been summoned there by regional party boss
Lavrenti Beria.
What is to be done?
The harvests have been good; I could see the fields from the train.
But the grain is not being delivered, why is that?
Is it because the peasants have been told
they can, if they wait, obtain better prices
and become richer at the expense of everyone else?
Who, who's told them this, who?
Comrade Stalin, I'm not sure you understand the situation:
the state offers low prices, unreasonably low prices.
The state wants us, peasants,
to work for the benefit of the people of the cities!
There's grumbling in my district!
Party officials could do not understand our peasants
come to the villages threatened.
The peasants complain that when they sell their grain they receive nothing in return.
There is nothing for them to buy.
I asked what is to be done and did you give me answers - No!
Only complaints.
Did you give me a solution? No.
So I will give you mine:
You will demand the surrenders of all stocks of grain at the existing prices.
Anyone who refuses, you will confiscate his grain.
You will bring anyone who opposes you to justice,
under article Number 107 of the criminal code,
which, I remind you, prescribes severe punishment for any kind of speculation.
But comrade Stalin...
Those are your instructions. These measures will be applied throughout the USSR.
Thank you for your ideas.
80 % of the Russian population were farmers
who lived and worked remote from party control.
For my father this represented a real danger.
Those he could not control might later become enemies.
What'll happen to us... ? - Our children... ?
Don’t you understand... - Comrade Beria, please...
Come on, come on. Go!
Come here! Come! Come.
Lavrenti Beria came to our house for the firs time that year.
I would see him often. He always frightened me.
He's a pervert. - Beria?
Sergo knew him in Georgia. Even before he became party boss.
He kidnapped this girl. He raped her. He forced her to marry him.
He still rapes women. Young girls.
He's thriving around. He sees someone. He says:
"Bring her in!"
And then he says: "If you don't want
something to happen to you or your family... "
Sergo hates him.
Why doesn't he say something to Josef? - He did.
And your husband said: "Mind your own business!" Just like that.
I'll talk to him.
You're declaring war on the peasants!
Forcing them to give their own land...
and move on to state collective farms. Already they're shooting their livestock;
they're eating their seed grain...
If you continue there will be a famine! - Bukharin, you are too soft.
There are reports that some peasants have already been shot.
Without trial. Thousands have been sent off to labor-camps, why?
Do we have to starve the country to feed the city?
The Politburo never agreed.
I know everyone's position.
But Lenin always said: "In the party we discuss and we debate. "
Don't try to bring Lenin into this, Bukharin. I know Lenin.
I'm going back to Moscow.
What will happen to Nikolai?
Josef allows no-one to stand up to him.
As you know he forced Trotsky into exile.
He doesn't forgive, he doesn't forget.
Zina, he trusts no-one, not even Sergo.
My Sergo, his oldest friend? Oh, you're imagining things.
He hates his own son, Yakov, humiliates him. No!
The only people close to him are his own creatures:
this evil pervert Beria who is not coming here again.
Kaganovich, Molotov, Voroshilov - those!
He loves you. - Does he?
Yakov!
What happened? - He wants to get married, I won't have it.
Why, who is she? - She's Jewish.
So? - So, you want him to marry a Jew, huh?
How can you say that? Huh? How can you feel that?
Mammy! - Get the doctor!
A flesh wound! - The doctor! And get Vasily out!
An idiot! Can't even shoot him right!
My son!? He-he...
Yakov survived. But my mother soul was wounded.
She'd... haven't enough of sleep.
Nadya! What had she been doing in Leningrad?
I've left him.
No! Nadya! Nadya, you don't understand...
YOU don't understand.
I do. Of course, I do.
He's... he's...
Do you want us to call him?
No... no...
Not yet, no...
You had an argument?
He is... suspicious of everyone... vicious, cruel!
Well, he has some rough ways, Koba. - He is not Koba, he's Stalin.
Of course, he is Stalin, he has to be Stalin!
Why would Russia be if he weren't Stalin?
He... he's been cruel to you?
But he's a good father? You've said many times he loves his children.
He has... somebody else? - No.
Not, of course not. He has burdens.
All the probles: straddling the selfish elements,
wrecking in the industry, sabotages.
The country’s in crisis, he needs you!
But, Sergei! - You can't desert your husband!
You're overtired. You stay here a few days.
All-right. All-right, I'll call him.
I'll explain to him you're tired, worn-out, ... distraught.
Oh, you need time, Nadya, to think calm,
and carefully.
If you don't go back, ...
what is going to happen to you?
To all of us?
You are the wife of comrade Stalin. You have his children.
Why don't you see? You are not anymore an ordinary person.
He's probably worrying the worse... He's to know where you are.
Hello, yes? Sergei.
It's your husband. He wants to talk to you.
Koba, she's coming.
You're going to Moscow? Tell comrade Stalin what is happening!
Tell him they have taken all: our lands,
all food, our lives.
They send us away... comrade Stalin doesn't know!
Tell him! Tell comrade Stalin!
Beria!
Don't dance with your life - you get in the way.
She's a wonderful dancer you say. You say! Tell her to show us.
Don't stop! Play, play!
Nadya! We'd be hoping you'd come.
So, you're back. Good, good.
I have a message for you.
My wife delivers messages.
From an old woman.
My wife delivers messages from old women.
The train stopped at a station. On one side there was a freight train.
Cars filled with people being deported.
Bodies pitched out onto the rails... One station! How many more are there!?
A woman ran to me, begging me to tell Stalin,
"The Great Stalin" that people were being starved to death.
If only the great Stalin knew then he would save his people.
But YOU celebrate the 15-th anniversary of the revolution
and comrade Stalin feeds his friends while his people starve.
Is this what the revolution was for?
Play! Play!
I'd better go.
Nadya!
I loved him, Zina! I loved him!
He'll never forgive me. He'll punish me, punishes everyone.
Perhaps you should go away for a while. - Where, where can I away from Stalin go?
Where they join of others.
Know - to a camp. Yes, he would send me to a camp!
No, he wouldn't do that. - No, you think not?
I would talk to him.
No?
Be careful.
Protect yourself. I'll beg for you.
I will go away somewhere, you were right.
I will go with you. - No!
My friend, my dear friend.
I have to go away alone.
Have to go alone. Just go away.
You were right.
You knew.
You take care of everyone while I am away. Huh?
I depend on you for this.
I love you.
Koba!
Cover her.
He told me that Nadya left him as it can't be.
That's why he didn't come to the funeral?
My friend has buried his heart today.
His heart? - He's berried his heart with a lie -
that come to me that all she died of appendicitis.
Yes, he loved her. Yes, he killed her.
Yes, he is killing millions on the country-side
and yes, our eyes are shut.
Who are we? What are we? What are we now?
Why did you betray me? why?
My father called the famine a fairy-tale.
And sold to other nations the grain that would have saved his own people.
He used the money to industrialize our nation of peasants.
The people were pushed day and night to make themselves greater,
Russia greater, Stalin greater.
All I knew was that my mother had been dead for two years and we missed her.
Wake up! Wake up, sleepy head!
Wake up, Wake up!
My little house-keeper is bringing me tedious this afternoon. Why?
Grandma's taking me to Nikolai's wedding.
Is that so. .
Sacha Vasiliyevna?
It's not only us that Hitler is threatening, it's the world.
We need a new strategy; we need to unite the word.
You're such an idealist, Bukharin. Where's the bride? This is for the bride!
Anya Michaylovna,
for years I've been waiting for you to be old enough to drink this.
Thank you, Uncle Sergei! - And this, Nikolai's for you.
What? What's that?
Oh! A fox!
I had this creature in the sites of my gun but it looked straight in my eyes.
"There's a renaissance man" it said, "You should take me as a present".
Tell the truth, Kirov, you were scared to death.
You tell the truth: how did you win this girl?
It was I who want him and it wasn't easy. I pretended I was younger than he was.
So I want to make a toast now.
To Nikolai! My gentle, open-hearted husband.
So believes in the goodness of people because he is good.
To Nikolai!
Hum, another guest!
Bukharchick, congratulations!
You forgot! Forgot.
Congratulations!
Papa!
Did you think you would merry our Nikolai, and Stalin not know about it?
Nikolai, Nikolai, you've outgone me again.
We all love you, Nikolai. Stalin loves him. Lenin loved him.
My dearest, dearest Nadya... loved him.
Is that not so?
What a beautiful bride! And I wish you both the greatest happiness!
Kirov. We need talk.
We'll send Yagoda's deputy to Leningrad.
What for?
There're people that want to get you.
No, believe me, believe me. Unsuspected ones...
trusted by you.
You have placed one of your own men in Leningrad?
The central committee...
The central committee have, without consulting me,
sent the man to NKVD in Leningrad?
He will be deputy... to your man Medved.
Thank you, comrade Stalin.
I have to get back to Leningrad.
Kirov was a popular man.
People who had turned against my father and his methods...
saw Kirov as their best hope for salvation.
And my father knew.
Yes.
Yes. One moment, please.
It's Stalin!
This is Yagoda.
Yes, comrade Stalin!
That summer my father reorganized state security.
And appointed Yagoda chief.
My father had many houses but the one he lived in most was just outside Moscow.
It was a fortress with walls and guards.
My father began to spend most of his time behind these walls.
Charlie Chaplin Yagoda, Charlie Chaplin.
Every film shown in Russia had to be personally approved by my father.
He loved American films the most: musicals, gangster movies, comedies.
Charlie Chaplin was his favorite.
Is the German material ready? - Yes, Koba.
You go on, this one would not interest you, Svetlana, go on.
Can you find your way back without me?
Oh, don't worry about papa, no... go!
Did you come to comrade Kirov last night? A very popular man, isn’t he?
Yes.
In Moscow it's not as in Leningrad. - Yes.
And Sergei is so - an exceptional leader, always considerate and always...
decisive? - Yes.
Do you not think he is aware of it? - Aware of... what, comrade Stalin?
The conspiracy! To make him General Secretary instead of me.
It's... hard to know, comrade Stalin.
It's your business to know.
Leningrad December 1, 1934
In the car, comrade Kirov, at least drove the curtains.
For safety. - For safety, my friend, I have you.
Comrade Medved. NKVD.
You were in charge of comrade's Kirov security?
Yes, comrade Stalin!
Comrade Nicolayev, why did you kill comrade Kirov, why?
I, I, ... - Don't lie!
You keep lying to comrade Stalin.
You didn't that alone, no. But who helped you?
Co... comrade Yagoda.
No, no. No.
You never saw comrade Yagoda before today.
You NEVER saw...
comrade Yagoda before today. Is that true?
It was someone else, who approached you - who would hate comrade Kirov?
One of Zinoviev's people, right?
But, you can't remember who. You need
help in remembering who.
We've arrested your wife, your mother, ... Know you want them released, don't you?
We'll send you to a new place, new home, new body-guard - to be very careful.
But... what am I... going... to remember?
What you're told: Names, places, ...
everything you've forgotten.
Yes. Here, do you want. Do you.
Get his confession and get rid of him, Yezhov.
Come on, Grisha, come with me.
First, they told that Kirov was killed by a personal enemy acting alone.
Now they say it was a conspiracy.
It probably was a conspiracy. - But whose?
It's like the burning of the Reichstag.
The Nazis' done it themselves and blamed it on the RMS.
What are you saying?
Grisha!
Why won't he come to me? - A fox has a mind of its own.
Even a red fox.
It was now a crime to criticize my father or his policies.
It became treason.
Bukharin and my daughter with his beautiful young wife.
And his fox.
He calls his fox Grisha, your name, Zinoviev.
It's a common name.
Yes, of course.
But... admit that Bukharin...
named his fox after you.
Koba. - Admit it.
Possibly, but he never told me. - Admit It!
Yes. - Yes, he named his fox after You.
Yes, Bukharin named his fox after me. - Koba...
Is it... it's easy to tell the truth.
So, why do you keep lying to comrades Yagoda and Yezhov?
Are they're being too kind to you?
Koba, let me tell you from experience we shared,
that Tsar's police were gentle compared to these...
And where is the Tsar now? - Koba, you know us.
We were side-by-side, side-by-side always trough the old regime.
We are still side-by-side together with you.
Under the inspired leadership of Lenin and Stalin.
How can you even believe that we are going to conspire with com...
with Trotsky to kill... comrade Kirov?
Traitors!
This... these tell that comrades Zinoviev and Kamenev
went along with Trotsky...
How did you come by these "confessions"? How are they obtained?
We can't tell you, Koba. - Perhaps they don't understand the law.
Measures against crime, among minors:
Children of 12 and over are subject to all measures of criminal punishment
including...
Including death. Yes, including death.
Tell comrade Kamenev about the evidence against his son.
You son has been on look-out... near comrade Stalin new dacha outside Moscow.
Preparing an attempt on Stalin's life.
Impossible! He is only fourteen!
Evidence. - Fabrications!
Evidence! - My son would never...
How can you ask us to say that we scheme with Hitlerites.
Who would believe that?
Anyone who hears and reads confessions. And everyone in the world
who hear and read and believe.
Shoot them.
They must be SHOT!
Shed the blood of old comrades; is that what you want, Yezhov... ?
If we agree: you promise that no-other old comrades be executed.
Their families will not be harmed? - The families, that's important.
And our lives, too?
Of course, all that goes without saying.
Koba!
They've lied to us! They lied to us! They promised we would not be killed.
This, our families... he said our families would not be hurt... he promised it,
he said it that if we confessed we would not be killed... he promised it...
We were promised our lives if we confessed.
Comrade Stalin has revoked his promise.
Grisha, shut up!
Be brave! Show them how men who stood with Lenin can die.
Not possible! And a comedy.
Could you do that? No, no. - Anatomically... no-no.
There goes our honor to Nikita, N. Khrushchev, already boss of Moscow.
You've come a long way from Ukraine, Nikita. Builder of our glorious Metro.
To our Nikita!
Like Lenin... ha-ha...
Show me your hands, Nikita.
Dirt under the fingernails! - Oh-o-o
Can you imagine he comes to Stalin's table with dirt on his fingernails!
It's really bad. - They are working on the field.
Listen to these gentlemen: their hands are clean and their nails are manicured.
Look!
These hands don't do work anymore. These hands are the hands of a gentleman.
Put all your hands out.
All these gentlemen hands have forgotten their proletarian origins.
Nikita.
To Nikita!
You did... now do the other-one. No-no. Do Zinoviev again.
Surprised that you didn't look this execution of Zinoviev and Kamenev.
You've sent Beria!
Ah, because I thought you may have not the stomach for it.
Wouldn't have been the first execution I have witnessed.
Not, but in your heart you're still "the Pharmacist. "
Yagoda concocting poisons; putting to death, making plots,
conspiracies;
... taking part in it.
Yezhov is replacing you. Take that back to Moscow.
You, stinking dwarf!
Your turn... will come.
Anya! Anya!
Kamenev and Zinoviev have been shot. - What?
Not only them. And I heard a rumor -
they implicated me. - What?
How can that be? - These days anything is possible.
Old comrades are falling all over its way to implicate all the old comrades.
And try to save their kids.
If Lenin had only lived... - Be careful!
Yes. Yes.
Police, strange things that have happened to me.
He knows that I understand why Kirov was killed.
I've seen through his scheme, the mass conspirator.
Accuses everyone else of conspiracy.
Eviction notice! You have one hour!
But... how can we make...
my books, my... my papers, my... wife, our child.
Those are my instructions. Out! One hour!
Hello? - Nikolai, how are you?
Are you there? It's me, Koba. How things're going?
I... I'm being evicted! - What?
The house's full of soldiers. - Who get to the heart of this?
No, who, the hell, does tell you to go out?
For you. Comrade Stalin.
Hello!
Who gave you those orders, who? Who?
Comrade Yezhov.
Comrade Yezhov? Comrade Yezhov is an idiot!
Get out of there - go! Out! OUT!
He would say Stalin has not a sense of humor, Yezhov.
February 18, 1937
I'm coming to drink with your husband. - He's expecting you.
You took flowers to Nadya's grave yesterday.
Thank you.
It's for you, open it.
If N. Bukharin is an enemy of the people then none of us is beyond suspicion.
Yes, yes.
You understand why it's happening? - No.
I thought so. These are dangerous times, Sergo.
We are getting stronger, our enemies wouldn't allow this.
Enemy agents have penetrated everywhere including high positions,
doing all they can to wreck our economy.
Anyone to follow the murder of Kirov wants the murder of Stalin.
I need your help, Sergo. - You have it.
I want you to testify against Bukharin. - Bukharin?
Yeah, you're close to him. Your Zina - his Anya Larina.
You are not in the string. Bukharin confides in you.
Approve your friendship to Stalin. Prove your loyalty to the state.
You want Me to denounce Bukharin? So that you could put him on trial?
Shoot him! Why go through all that?
Make it simple.
Our grate leader defends the Soviet people.
Here.
You do it. You shoot Bukharin yourself.
Have you got the guts?
Put it down - we've seen guns before, they don't frighten me.
Put it down. There.
So, you won't denounce Bukharin, huh?
When your own brother has denounced you.
Your brother has confessed that you, Sergo,
gave orders as commissar of heavy industry
for excess sabotage and wrecking
in the factories.
My brother has confessed?
You must admit there had been
too many incidents, too many.
You let my brother be beaten, tortured?
Bring him here to Moscow. I want us both to see.
It's too late. - Too late?
Too-o late... ha-ha. - You bastard!
You will kill us all!
Oh no! Sergo, Sergo, no!
You won't shoot comrade Stalin.
If you did, the country would be in chaos.
The fascist would invade... they would take to country
and you would go down in history as the man who betrayed Russia to the Germans.
And the people oh, ... the people would tear you,
your wife and your children.
Everyone who bears the name Ordzhonikidze, they would tear him to pieces.
Eat your heart. Drink your blood.
No, no; no - you won't shoot comrade Stalin.
I think you will shoot yourself.
And we'll call it, er, a heart attack
brought out by comrade Ordzhonikidze has worked day and night.
Their hero, the Soviet Union's glory is dead.
And we will bury you with all honors.
In the Kremlin Wall...
close to the tomb of Lenin.
No-one would ever know what a traitor you would be
in any part of the country.
And your family would be... safe and honored.
That I promise.
You promise?! - That's all you have, left, Sergo.
Wait!
You were in the seminary. You'll recognize the words:
"Even as I have seen, they that plow iniquity, and sow wickedness,
reap the same. "
It's the book of Jove.
"By the blast of God they perish, and by the breath of his nostrils
are they consumed. "
?Subtitles made by TheDoubleXer ?/b>
My father got his word this time - Sergo was given a hero's funeral.
His ashes were placed in the Kremlin Wall and Zina was left unharmed.
Papa!
My little house-keeper has become a door-keeper.
Comrade Door-keeper.
Where did you get that dress?
It's too short. Cover your knees.
And look at your legs - they're bare.
Change your dress. But put on stockings.
You weren't at Sergo's funeral. Why?
I've... I am not feeling well.
I'll send the doctor. - No, it's nothing. Don't bother.
I don't want to lose you, too. So, take care of yourself.
Sergo didn't.
Heart attack. - Yes.
They are all taking off. Like birds from a branch.
Yeah, ha... like birds from a branch.
Koba, forgive me. I'm a simple old woman.
No, I don't understand: why they are missing.
No, how, did it, suddenly turn out
we had so many enemies? - Olga!
These are people we have known all our lives.
They are... were army officers, ... loyal party...
my real friends, ... civil war heroes.
Now, what is happening?
Why are these people dying? Can you tell me?
And why is everyone who knew my daughter,
everyone who loved Nadya...
disappearing, being arrested?
But, who is destroying them? Is it you? - Olga! For God's sake!
Why not arrest us all?
Yes! Why not?
Koba. Be silent, be silent!
Why should I be silent? Why won't let him kill me to?
You drove my daughter to suicide. It was because of you she killed herself.
That's much better, you'll feel better now.
Now it's much, much better, comrade House-keeper.
My little sparrow.
Accused Bukharin!
March 2, 1938
Accused Bukharin! You have heard. The other defendants testify
that you're a part of a conspiracy, under the direction of the arch-traitor Trotsky,
to overthrow the Soviet regime.
To this end, numerous acts of terrorism have been committed,
including the murder of Sergei Kirov
and even the planning of the assassination of comrade Stalin.
What a miserable gang of traitors!
Openly sitting in my office. What a miserable gang of traitors!
Confession's good for their souls.
And now Bukharin...
The climax of our play.
We have all heard the accused Yagoda state that you discussed with him
a plot to murder Sergei Kirov.
I can't imagine why he said that.
There has been no such discussion.
I knew nothing of any scheme to murder Kirov!
According to Yagoda testimony, Kirov...
You didn't break him, huh? How could you fail?
Core recess. Core recess.
You had months and months...
Let me have him for one night...
I'll have him confess he is the king of England.
I have done my duty. I've done everything you asked;
even my own deputy. I am myself disclosed.
Top officials under your command, plotting against Stalin.
And you supposingly are not involved?
Involved, involved?!
You yourself told me to purge the security apparatus to get new people.
Yezhov, Yezhov, you monster!
Are you trying to tell me you deliberately allowed people to be...
purged?! To be killed?!
What have you done, Yezhov?
How could you, Possibly, Pay for your terrible crimes?
For comrade Stalin.
I beg you to spare my wife and child.
On March 12th 1939 without warning,
the German Army marched over the Austrian border.
It was really all-awaited full-scale invasion test,
and Hitler rode and triumphed in Vienna.
An ominous development. - You think so? I don't know, I...
You've got to admire Hitler - nobody wants it and he isn't afraid to go for it.
He scares the British and French but not comrade Stalin.
He's a fascist. Wants to destroy us. He says it over and over.
He says a lot of things we all do.
I think right now Hitler is looking east
and he's saying that: "Stalin, I can work with him. "
So, is it done?
I gave it the personal touch.
Did he say anything? - He asked me to give you this.
"Koba, why did you need my death? Why?"
And this is what: Trotsky -
how did he get through our fingers?
He lives in Mexico City.
In that house they converted into a fortress.
Why don't you get rid of him?
Yakov had gone through military school and joined the army.
All in a vain attempt to win our father's approval.
You have a grand-daughter!
So, you're going to be an artillery officer?
Yes. We are calling her... - I hope you don't show on our own lines.
I will do my duty.
With all the stretch in the higher command lieutenants like you
may be commanding divisions.
I will do whatever is required of me.
Yakov!
June 22, 1941
So. What is the situation here?
The Germans are attacking everything.
There! Panzers have penetrated our lines, their air force dominates...
We've lost almost 1000 aircrafts. - A 1000 - how could that be?
Most were destroyed on the ground. - On the ground?!
Despite warnings and recommendations they were left in forward positions.
Now. Counter-attack! Here, ... here and here!!!
Koba, you don't understand the situation?
Our front is crumbling; our forces are retreating trying to avoid capture!
No capture. No retreat, no surrender. Attack!
Beria! Beria!
Bring the security troops shoot anyone trying to retreat.
Shoot our own man!?
Yes, and we'll shoot you, too! You, incompetent foo-o-ol!
Koba!
How can you say that!?
Who killed the whole our best-of generals?
40 000 of our best officers.
Called them enemies of the people, had them shot?
Who trusted Hitler? Who said he would not attack us?
Voroshilov? NO! It was you!
It Was YOU!
More! You do it more! More!
Koba.
Koba,
It's been ten days.
We're waiting for you. No-one could do anything.
Koba, they love you!
They are calling for you.
"Comrade Stalin,
save us!" - Da.
"Save us!", they say. "Save us!"
Klim.
They didn't kill you?
How could they?
Without Stalin's orders? - Da!
Comrades. Citizens. Brothers and sisters.
We are united in the patriotic war against an enemy who is trying
to turn our people
into slaves of the Germans.
We will resist.
We will hound and annihilate the enemy.
We will show no mercy.
Hitler will go the way of Napoleon...
to defeat, ... to despair...
and to his death!
Your son, Yakov, has been taken prisoner.
I have no son Yakov, hum, ... ?
No.
What you're waiting for?!
I hardly saw my father during the war.
When he learned that Yakov was killed trying to escape from a German camp
he never told me.
The Germans reached the gates of Moscow itself
and they surrounded Stalingrad, too. When we finally pushed them back
20 million of our people had died.
It wasn't until near the end of the war, at the burial of my grand-father,
that I saw my father again.
February 1945
It was the first time our family had been together for years.
At least Sergei knew we did everything we could.
The best doctors...
He died of silence, he didn't die of cancer.
Kept in silence when his friends, his comrades...
were sent to prison, were killed.
Keep your mouth shut!
What you have done, you, old bitch?
Look at my son, the general! Can you stand on your own feet, Vasily?
And you, Svetlana? Don't use that as an excuse to bring your Jew-husband around.
What did you teach them - to raise my son to be a drunk?
And my daughter - do I have to say?
What could I've expected?
Did you teach your own daughter to be loyal to her husband?
And you're trying to turn them against me. Sergei but he knew me.
Sergei knew me.
The drunk - put him in jail for a while, sober him up.
My family - what a curse they are.
The Ukrainian SSR
thanks our liberator, the great comrade Stalin
best friend of all children!
The Uzbek SSR thanks our great leader:
the genius comrade Stalin for Victory!
We do not thank comrade Stalin for our victory.
We all know it was not Stalin who defeated the Germans.
Comrade Stalin it was You!
We do not thank comrade Stalin for our victory.
Our "Thanks" goes to the great
Russian people!
Your victory is a declaration to the world that the Russian people
believe in a better future
and stand ready to make
whatever sacrifice is a necessary to achieve the great construction
of socialism.
In the winter of 1950 my father sent for me.
I had heard that his memory was fading.
And that he was suspicious of everyone around him.
Now he wanted to see me.
And for the fist time his grandson, Josef.
Wait! Give mama your hand.
Go to grandpa.
He has Jewish eyes.
Look! Who's that man?
He's someone who makes sure that everything is all-right.
Don't ask so many questions. - Why?
Because I think you don't have to know. - Why?
Why, why... a real Jew.
I always carry something for the squirrels.
See. Now, here. You feed it.
Here. Hold it out. You feed it. Feed it.
You feed it.
Why that look?
I want you to free Anya Bukharin.
It has a beautiful red tail. It won't bite it.
Mind your business!
You haven't the slidest idea of what you're talking about.
She's harmless.
You know about harmless; what, the hell, you know?
I know people are disappearing again.
Enemies!
Go to your mama.
They had no adherence to the Soviet Union.
Enemies!
Grandpa's nice. - Yes.
Well. For a man your age,
73, you have a remarkable constitution.
In the Caucasus a man of 70 is still young. He can mount a horse... or a woman.
But still... you have had discus spills and...
perhaps angina.
And...
Your blood pressure is dangerously high.
What do you recommend? - As little work as possible.
Fruits, vegetables, ... injections of vitamins.
No injection, no.
I will write a prescription.
No prescriptions. I have my own remedy.
Go away, don't work, rest...
Isn't that what they told Lenin?
Thank you, Vinogradov.
You may go, now!
Yes, thank you.
No!... No!
No!
Taste it, Lavrenti! - I don't like soup.
Taste it!
Look how your father spends his nights - with this boring bunch of old men.
Where're you going? - Home.
No, no! Stay!
A promise from papa: it will get more interesting.
Now, sit down. Sit.
You eat, Lavrenti!
We have so far.
Fun at the expense of this four until you eat.
Dance Nikita! - No, no, no. With these feet... ?!
No, you go there! - Dance Nikita!
Why don't you go who told me?
But don't be shy, dance!
Dance Lavrenti!
I'm out of breath.
I'm going old. - No.
No, no. You'll live forever.
Now, we have to...
Who could follow Stalin, who would follow Stalin?
None of you is worthy.
So:
I'm going to rid myself of all of you.
This soup you've eaten...
was poisoned.
As you're gonna see, I didn't touch mine.
Papa.
You're joking, Koba.
No. No.
You have to be.
And you see... this is
fun.
Yes! Yes!
But you, all of you: what do you think would happen...
without Stalin?
Svetlana, come.
Come here. Close the door. Come.
You know, I loved your mother. Beautiful,
but she... was a fool this woman.
She didn't understand the situation;
what had happened, what I had to do.
She listened to certain people and she turned against me.
She became my enemy...
and then she betrayed me. She killed herself.
You killed yourself to strike a plot against me.
Why?
It was your fault.
You caused it.
You're just like her.
You listen to my enemy - Jews full of lethal poison.
Just that she did.
You let them turn you against me.
And who they are I'll take good care of them.
Are you thinking I don't know what you say?
I know! Stalin knows.
I know what you say,
what you do; who you screw.
I know everything.
Get out of here.
Papa.
This is a baby pig. For you.
Thank you.
Two bad girls.
Jimmy Druedack.
My time has come. Jimmy Druedack.
Here!
Paste.
March 5, 1953
Come with us, please!
Go! Go forth!
You're a doctor, aren't you?
Why don't you take care of his hand properly!
I'm sorry.
A hemorrhage... in his brain.
He can't... breath.
Let him suffer!
Murdering bastard!
Oh, forgive me! Forgive me!
Have you wondered... ?
Why did Beria...
waited a day, before calling the doctor?
Now, I've wondered.
He'll try to take power.
It'll be as bad as before.
You said "as bad"?
I did? - You did.
What have you thought about it?
About what we'll say after Stalin dies.
About what? - His crimes.
What crimes? - Millions.
Nikita. You are too emotional. You talk too much.
Who are we to judge Stalin?
Before him we were a weak backward country... and now look at us:
we control half of Europe. The whole of China.
We have the atomic bomb.
We command a respect.
Without Stalin... it would've taken 20 years longer.
I don't believe that.
Without the purges, the arrests, the killings...
Without Stalin
we could've been a great nation.
Our history required Stalin.
Papa! Papa!
Stop it, please.
Can't you see the man is dead?
in Russian: To whom you are leaving me... My God... .
in Russian: I'll be waiting for you...
Three months after Stalin's death,
Lavrenti Beria was executed by his former associates.
Three years later, Nikita Khrushchev began to reveal publicly
the nature and extent of Stalin's crimes.
Svetlana Alliluyeva is alive and lives in England.
Josef Stalin's crimes caused the deaths of tens of millions of Soviet citizens.
Stalin ROBERT DUVALL Nadya JULIA ORMOND
Lenin MAXIMILIAN SCHELL Bukharin JEROEN KRABBE
Olga JOAN PLOWRIGHT Sergei FRANK FINLAY
Beria ROSHAN SETH Trotsky DANIEL MASSEY
Zinoviev ANDRAS BALINT Voroshilov JOHN BOWE
Sergo JIM CARTER Khrushchev MURRAY EWAN and others.
This docudrama is based on extensive research of the public record.
It was made without the endorsement or authorization of any person depicted in the film.