East-West (1999)/#####/***  A naive Russian emigre and his family repatriate to the post-WWII Soviet Union, only to discover, too late, the full truth about life under socialism. [Dir: Regis Wargnier/ Sandrine Bonnaire, Oleg Menchikov, Catherine Deneuve/ 120min/ Drama/ French]

We live in an age when reality, including historical reality, is pretty much defined by film. In the mind of a public far more accustomed to watching movies than reading books, if it never appeared on film (or at least on television), it didn't happen. That's why this rare film about the hell that was Stalin's Soviet Union is so important. By simply telling accurately one of the many incidents of Soviet crimes against humanity, it does much to inform the viewer of what that unhappy state was all about.

In particular, it relates the experience of Russian emigres who voluntarily returned to the Soviet Union following WWII. Millions of Russians had fled to the West after the 1917 Bolshevik revolution. However, during WWII, Russian participation in Allied victories against Nazi Germany stimulated renewed patriotic feeling among these emigres. So, when Stalin invited them back (with amnesty) to help rebuild their home country, many thousands returned.

The character of their reception could not have been more unexpected. As soon as they arrived, most were either shot on the spot or sent to labor camps. Stalin didn't like emigres, as he suspected them of treason. Inviting them to come back was just a trap, a way to get rid of them.

The family at the center of this story represents the "lucky" ones among these emigres. When they enter the Soviet Union, they don't get executed or sent to the labor camps because the father is a doctor, and the Soviet state needs doctors. Nonetheless, the mother is interrogated and beaten, and the family is under constant threat of being separated. It's clear that repatriating was a mistake, and getting out won't be easy.

Most of the rest of the film is about their desperate struggle to survive and to escape, and the toll that struggle takes on their relationships. The ultimate escape of the mother and child involves tremendous, touching heroisms on the part of many, heroisms that will surely melt the heart of even the most dedicated Leftist. In the background to these events, we get a feel for the everyday downside of Soviet life: unremitting poverty, sudden arrests and executions, and pervasive fear.

Although fictional in some respects, this drama is based on a montage of actual experiences, the surviving stories of those who survived. It has a realistic flavor, making the most of on-location scenery in Eastern Europe and France (the emigres had been living there), and employing actors and actresses from the same locations. Catherine Deneuve is the most recognizable of the players here, but it's the story itself that is the real attraction.

That this film was made at all is something of a surprise. Thanks to the Left-wing sympathies of most involved in the dramatic arts, the horrors of totalitarian socialism (apart from National Socialism) are almost untold in modern cinema. This unusual French film is a rare drop of truth in a desert of calculated silence. Subtitled.

Update: "East-West" was nominated for the "Best Foreign Language Film" Academy Award.

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Miss Liberty's Guide to Film & Video: Movies for the Libertarian Millennium.