Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated) Binding: VHS Tape EAN: 9781565800069 Format: Black & White ISBN: 1565800060 Label: Facets Video Manufacturer: Facets Video Number Of Items: 1 Publisher: Facets Video Release Date: 1998-11-18 Running Time: 29 Studio: Facets Video Theatrical Release Date: 1968-09-29
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Spotlight customer reviews:
Customer Rating: Summary: A video of how force was applied to eastern Europe Comment: To me, the most amazing thing about communism turned out to be how shallow it was. Seventy years elapsed from the time of the Bolshevik revolution to the pseudo-coup that led to the rise of Yeltsin. Despite all of the blood shed in defense of communism, it died with little more than a whimper. It can be argued that the last chance for communism to have a chance in the modern world took place in Czechoslovakia in 1968. The leaders of the Prague spring were communists whose goal was to simply loosen up the tight controls rather than join the west. Such changes could have led to a more viable form of communism that may have been flexible enough to survive into the 21st century. Unfortunately, the blossom was nipped before it could bloom and this film is about the events when the Warsaw pact troops crushed the attempt at liberalization. The looks on the faces of the people as the tanks roll through the streets tell the complete story. This was a the brutal application of force to put down what was a popular movement. It is powerful and shows the reality of what Soviet domination of Eastern Europe really meant. It was only a coincidence that the film makers were in Czechoslovakia when the tanks rolled in. However, that allowed the event to be captured for posterity on film, which is of enormous historical benefit. There was to be one more crackdown and twenty years before communism died in Eastern Europe, but this film captures what it all meant in only 26 minutes. It should be viewed by all interested in the history of that era, which is now over a decade behind us. Customer Rating: Summary: Very real... Comment: When the Russians came to Prague I was 19 a I lived there. The Movie is telling the Story. Russia will never change. Ever the Enemy of the West.
