When it comes to mass murderers, they don't get much bigger or worse than the Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin. Ruling the Soviet Union from the mid-1920's to 1953, his reign was one of death and terror on a scale of such heights that it would give Adolf Hitler a run for his money as to who was worse. And yet surprisingly there are very few films (at least in the Western world) made about this man or his reign of terror. One of the few films from the west about him is the HBO produced docudrama "Stalin". Made not long after the fall of the Soviet Union in 1992, it pretty accurately chronicles Stalin, from his rise in the Bolshevik party to the height of his monolithic power at the end of World War II. Playing Stalin is Robert Duvall. Now I admit, at first glance that sounds like one of the worst casting decisions ever. However, believe me when I tell you that not only does Duvall look and sound like Stalin through the use of good makeup and an accent, he BECOMES Stalin. In fact, the more the movie went on, the less and less I saw him as Duvall and the more and more I saw him as the real Stalin. It's a real testament to Duvall's ability as an actor, especially considering that Duvall is about as far away from an ethnic Georgian as you can get (Stalin was from the former Soviet Georgia). I would even go as far to say that Duvall's portrayal of Stalin is perhaps the closest we have as to who the real Stalin was, a paranoid mass murderer who was just as much at ease condemning his former close comrades to death as he was starving the Russian peasants in order to pay for the industrialization of the Soviet Union.
Of course, Duvall's performance is the not the only good one here; the epic drama boasts an amazing supporting cast in the form of the late, great Maximilian Schell as Lenin, Julia Ormond as Stalin's suffering wife Nadya, Joan Plowright as Nadya's mother Olga, Roshan Seth as the treacherous Beria, and many more that I don't have the space for. In addition, the sets for the Kremlin are breath taking and for good reason: It's the real thing! The film crew was granted unprecedented freedom to the Kremlin buildings after the fall of Soviet Union, as well as the dacha just outside Moscow that Stalin stayed at the most. All of this gives the film a very realistic look that might not have been possible otherwise. Some people have expressed disappointment that the film did not pay as much attention to Stalin's atrocities as maybe it could have and it is indeed true that we barely get a brief look at World War II from Stalin's viewpoint, the war that propelled him to his greatest heights of power. However one has to keep in mind that there's only so much you can put in a film, especially when it's a film about Stalin.
Furthermore, I would argue that we do get a look at Stalin's crimes, albeit a subtle one, be it the scene where Nadya witnesses people being herded into cattle cars while passing through a train station or the general talk of people disappearing left and right throughout the film. It's also important to keep in mind that the film is meant to be about the man Stalin and the effect he had on those closest to him and on this, the film largely succeeds. The movie is also thankfully widely available on you tube and DVD as well, which makes viewing it very easy. In short, "Stalin" is a film that one should watch, not only because of the importance of history but as a warning to future generations of what can happen when people collectively give up freedoms, checks and balances, their faith in God and what's right, and instead put all their hope in one man with absolute power over life and death. For in the words of Lord Acton, "Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men." These words indeed describe Stalin to a tee. So watch, learn, and never forget the lessons of the monster that was Joseph Stalin.
Of course, Duvall's performance is the not the only good one here; the epic drama boasts an amazing supporting cast in the form of the late, great Maximilian Schell as Lenin, Julia Ormond as Stalin's suffering wife Nadya, Joan Plowright as Nadya's mother Olga, Roshan Seth as the treacherous Beria, and many more that I don't have the space for. In addition, the sets for the Kremlin are breath taking and for good reason: It's the real thing! The film crew was granted unprecedented freedom to the Kremlin buildings after the fall of Soviet Union, as well as the dacha just outside Moscow that Stalin stayed at the most. All of this gives the film a very realistic look that might not have been possible otherwise. Some people have expressed disappointment that the film did not pay as much attention to Stalin's atrocities as maybe it could have and it is indeed true that we barely get a brief look at World War II from Stalin's viewpoint, the war that propelled him to his greatest heights of power. However one has to keep in mind that there's only so much you can put in a film, especially when it's a film about Stalin.
Furthermore, I would argue that we do get a look at Stalin's crimes, albeit a subtle one, be it the scene where Nadya witnesses people being herded into cattle cars while passing through a train station or the general talk of people disappearing left and right throughout the film. It's also important to keep in mind that the film is meant to be about the man Stalin and the effect he had on those closest to him and on this, the film largely succeeds. The movie is also thankfully widely available on you tube and DVD as well, which makes viewing it very easy. In short, "Stalin" is a film that one should watch, not only because of the importance of history but as a warning to future generations of what can happen when people collectively give up freedoms, checks and balances, their faith in God and what's right, and instead put all their hope in one man with absolute power over life and death. For in the words of Lord Acton, "Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men." These words indeed describe Stalin to a tee. So watch, learn, and never forget the lessons of the monster that was Joseph Stalin.