Strike (1925)

A group of oppressed factory workers go on strike in pre-revolutionary Russia.

Director:

Sergei M. Eisenstein

Writers:

Grigoriy Aleksandrov, Sergei M. Eisenstein

Stars:

Grigoriy Aleksandrov, Maksim Shtraukh, Mikhail Gomorov

Cast

Complete credited cast:
Maksim Shtraukh	...	Police Spy
Grigoriy Aleksandrov	...	Factory Foreman
Mikhail Gomorov	...	Worker
I. Ivanov	...	Chief of Police
Ivan Klyukvin	...	Revolutionary
Aleksandr Antonov	...	Member of Strike Committee
Yudif Glizer	...	Queen of Thieves
Anatoliy Kuznetsov
Vera Yanukova
Vladimir Uralskiy	...	(as V. Uralsky)
M. Mamin
Rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Boris Yurtsev	...	King of Thieves

Storyline

In Russia's factory region during Czarist rule, there's restlessness and strike planning among workers; management brings in spies and external agents. When a worker hangs himself after being falsely accused of thievery, the workers strike. At first, there's excitement in workers' households and in public places as they develop their demands communally. Then, as the strike drags on and management rejects demands, hunger mounts, as does domestic and civic distress. Provocateurs recruited from the lumpen and in league with the police and the fire department bring problems to the workers; the spies do their dirty work; and, the military arrives to liquidate strikers.

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Plot Keywords:

strike | factory | spy | working | police | 

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Genres:

Drama

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Certificate:

Not Rated

Details

Country:

Soviet Union

Release Date:

1961 (USA)

Also Known As:

La grève

Company Credits

Production Co:

Goskino, Proletkult

Technical Specs

Runtime:

82 min 94 min (DVD special edition)

Sound Mix:

Silent

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.33 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

The earliest Russian-Soviet film included among the "1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die", edited by Steven Schneider.

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Goofs

The story is set in 1903. Throughout the film automobiles from the 1920s appear on streets. One is the 1920s auto that the worker (who stole the administrators' posted reply to workers' demands) tried to use to escape police goons during a nighttime rainstorm; when upper class women appear, they are wearing contemporary 1920s fashions, and the popular music that's on the sound track is also from the 1920s.

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Quotes

Activist #1: They've backed us into a corner. We have to strike...

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Connections

Featured in Eisenstein in Guanajuato (2015)

User Reviews

Pre-Potemkin

It takes place during the 1912 Factory Strike in Russia. This was the brilliant debut of Sergei Eisenstein which introduced the idea of montage. Done before Potemkin, Stachka/Strike(1925) is a film about the struggle of the working class against the Tsar. The film showed of things to come for the career of Eisenstein. This was to be part of a series of films concerning the events that led to the 1917 Revolution. He shows the working class as the main protagonist in Strike. Was co-written by frequent co-writer Grigori Aleksandrov.

Stachka and Battleship Potemkin would be the only films in which Eisenstein would have complete artistic control. Like Potemkin, it also features a grand massacre sequence. Eisenstein's direction is nothing short of first class. October(1927) can be looked upon as a sequel to Strike. The images of this is an example of why the silent period was the last truly great era of visual filmmaking. Strike would be the first of many great movies from a master artist. A fine scene is the superimposition of a slaughtered bull over a scene of massacred workers.