Narrated by Meryl Streep, this award-winning historical documentary examines the Stalinist purges and terror in the former Soviet Union during the 1930's and 40's, when an estimated twenty million people lost their lives - some in labor camps, others starved in state-induced famine, and many others executed for "crimes against the state." The 1917 Bolshevik (or Communist) Revolution laid the foundation for the later collectivization and subjugation of the peasant classes, along with the systematic quota-driven elimination of those who where perceived to be a threat to Stalin's policies. This film contains many survivor and eyewitness accounts of the resulting torture, executions, and mass burials. The film ends with current efforts to document the atrocities and the slow process of bringing the guilty to justice. - Ukrainians killed by Soviet secret police in 1945. - In the 1930s and 1940s millions of people were killed by the Soviet state. Their bodies still lie hidden in mass graves. Only since the breakup of the Soviet Union have people been able to search for these graves, exhume the remains and give them a proper burial. - 0:38 Mass slaughter in Ukraine reached all levels of society and altered life in every Ukrainian town and village. - 0:58 600 families were repressed, deported, and sentenced. Ukrainian villages Dorohosil and Vyltychaty. - 2:20 Black and white footage from 1930s Soviet Union, Joseph Stalin, Lenin's Tomb. No fewer than 20 million people lost their lives. - 2:45 Death by labour camps and state induced famines. More than 1.5 million people were executed for crimes against the state. - 3:07, 23:04 Zbigniew Brzezinski, Former U.S. National Security Advisor - 4:05 Roman Szporluk, Historian Harvard University - 5:08 October 25, 1917 Vladimir Lenin's Bolsheviks take control of the Winter Palace. - 6:05 Robert Conquest, Historian Stanford University - 9:00 Greatest resistance from Ukrainian peasants and villages. The Song of the Harvestors of Ukraine. - 10:00 Ukraine was particularly dangerous for Stalin - 12:20 NKVD, Nikolai Yezhov - 13:14 Mykola Holushko, Former KGB Official - 15:00 Olha Ern, Lidia Raevska - 18:35 Old colour footage of Kyiv, Ukraine. Chekists Block - 18:55 Les Taniuk, Theatre Director - 19:52 Former NKVD headquarters Vinnystia, Ukraine - 20:00 Mykola Lastovetsky - 21:27 Demianiv Laz - 21:45 Mykhailo Teodorovych - 21:53 Stepan Fedyk - 22:24 Bohdan Fedyk - 23:23 Most interesting feature of the terror was the quota system - 26:22 Olenka Kozaniwsky, former prisoner, Lviv. Zamarstyniv prison - 27:39 Bohdan Kozaniwsky, former prisoner, Lviv. - 28:28 All the Ukrainian girls were beaten the same way as men. - 32:32 Black and white footage Nazi Germany, Adolf Hitler. - 33:10 In June 1941 Nazi Germany invades Soviet Union with 3 million men and thousands of tanks. Ukraine World War Two. Russia World War Two. - 34:45 Footage of dead bodies killed in Soviet prisons and jails. - 36:01 Vasyl Novoselytsky - 36:22 Mykola Kudelia - 36:47 Ukrainian Nationalist Organization - 40:02 Ukrainians enter Lutsk prison. - 40:34 Old colour footage of Lviv, Ukraine. - 40:44 Ihor Kalynets, Andrii Holyi - 42:11 Iryna Ruda - 43:03 Hannah Stetsko - 47:44 German occupation of Kyiv, Ukraine during World War Two - 51:57 Luka Puhach - 52:35 Terror of Stalinism - 53:55 Red Army invades Ukraine (Castle Films) - 54:40 Underground insurgency in Ukraine. Ukrainian nationalists opposed to Germany - 56:50 Mykhailo Baranets - 58:00 Anna Malynovska - 1:06:20 Mykola Holushko Focusing on Ukraine, the film incorporates historical footage, interviews with witnesses and survivors, public officials and historians; including Robert Conquest of Stanford University and author of "The Great Terror," former U.S. National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski and Roman Szporluk of Harvard University.

• published: 27 Mar 2014
• views: 6579