STALIN - Life and Death of a Dictator

Part 1: Stalin, Lenin and the Revolution | Part 2: Stalin, Trotsky and the Terror | Part 3: Stalin, Hitler and the War | Part 4: Stalin, Beria and the Bomb | Part 5: Stalin, Khrushchev and Death

Author & Director:

Martin Huebner | Daniel Ast | Juergen Ast

Commissioning Editors:

Dagmar Mielke | Rolf Bergmann

Duration:

5 x 12' | 60'

Producer:

Juergen Ast | Daniel Ast

Coproduction:

astfilm pictures UG | RBB // ARTE | ARD | funded with means of the Federal Foundation for the reappraise of the SED-Dictatorship

It is the story of his bloody career, a boundless paranoia and a cult that was to make him immortal. The film recounts the last days of Stalin's life, which he spent in his secret dacha in Kuntsevo, 20 minutes from the Kremlin. It was here, in early March 1953, that the dictator's long dying began. His death marked the end of an era. Historical retrospectives and digressions recount the various facets of his tyranny: his rise to cruel despot, how he became a myth, a "wise and powerful leader," the embodiment of strength and determination. The cult elevated him for millions to an almost divine, immortal being. A being who had millions on his conscience.

Today, decades after his death, his myth is experiencing a resurgence in Putin's Russia. This includes the narrative of the permanent threat from outside, from the West, against which one must defend oneself, as well as the perpetual struggle against internal enemies, spies and "pests" who must be liquidated. Stalin's life and death - a chapter of world history, told above all with exclusive graphic novel sequences by Vincent Burmeister.