The film is based on Soviet film minister Boris Shumyatsky's notes on night screenings which in the 1930s-1940s took place 6-8 times a month in the Kremlin for Stalin and his associates. Stalin, considered the cinema as a means of ideological propaganda
The General Secretary was, in fact, the producer of all Soviet cinema - it was under him that the national film industry was built, and the Soviet Union became one of the main cinematic powers. Stalin himself watched a huge number of films, checked everything - from the script to editing and dubbing, decided the fate of films and filmmakers with one stroke of the pen.
The executed grandson of Boris Shumiatsky, the grandson of Stalin himself, as well as well-known Russian film critics tell exactly how Stalin led Soviet cinema and filmmakers.
