Extremely pro-Stalin & Soviet Union movie made in Hollywood at the very hight of WWII when Germany was on the verge, during the battle of Stalingrad, of knocking the USSR out of the war. Based on the book "Mission to Moscow" by the former US Soviet Ambassador Joseph E.Davies, who in fact introduces the film, were shown how the Soviet Union under the leadership of Premier Joseph Stalin was the envy of the free world in it's heroic struggle against Nazi Germany. It was the Soviet Red Army who that during the course of the war lost an estimated 9 million of its fighting man and women battling Nazi Germany.
Given the job as Ambassador to the Soviet Union in 1937 by Pres. Roosevelt, Jack Young, Davies, Walter Huston, is given the assignment to check out what's going on in that country and report back to the president if it will be a reliable ally if a future conflict between Britian & France that breaks out with Nazi Germany. In what seems like no time at all Davies develops a love affair with the USSR and it's ruthless dictator Joseph or "Uncle Joe" as President Roosevelt calls him the Man of Steel himself Joseph V. Stalin played by the kind sweet and fatherly looking Mamart Kipper. The what seems like very naive Davies,who should have known better,is completely blown away by Uncle Joe's "great" accomplishments. That's in him bringing the backward and 19th century Russia into the 20th century with his series of 5 year economic plans. Plans not originated by "Uncle Joe" but his late boss and first leader of the Soviet Union Nickolai 'Nicky" Lennin.
Even though very pro-Stalin the movie surprisingly doesn't skip over the notorious 1937/38 purge trials conducted by Stailn's henchmen in the Soviet Ministry of Justice and the dreaded NKVD. It was at those trials that the almost entire Soviet diplomatic and Red Army office corps were convicted and executed for treason. They were all accused in them planning with the exiled and deposed, by Stalin, Leon Trotsky, Sam Goldenberg, with the Hitler's Germany and Imperial Japan of trying to undermined and overthrow the Stalin regime. As It turned it wasn't treason that they were guilty of but Stalin's hysterical paranoia of feeling threatened by anyone close to him trying to throw him out of power!
The movie goes on making excuse after excuse for Stalin's crimes,like the invasions of Poland Finland and the Baltic States,in that they were needed to get his country ready for the coming invasion by Hitler's Germany which he was certain was soon to come. Yet when the Nazi invasion finally came in June 1941 Stalin's well prepared for it Red Army was caught flat-footed having the German Army reach the very gates of Moscow before the year was out. Davies now back in the US and a private citizen does his best to get the American people, who at the time was very isolationist, ready to both supply the Soviet Union with military hardware as well as join it in it's battle against Germany. But as fate would have it it was japan's sneak attack on Pearl Harbor, six months after Hitler invaded the USSR, that did the trick for both him and President Roosevelt. It was Pres.Roosevelt who's behind the scenes actions was doing everything to incite a German U-Boat attack on US shipping in order to get the US into the war. What was so ironic about that is that it was Hitler's Germany who did everything possible to avoid a conflict with the USA, even having his U-boats not return fire after being fired upon by the US Navy, not the US that was the first to declare war!
Despite the Soviet Union being an ally of the US at the time of the films release it in fact bombed at the box office not even making back half of the 1.5 million dollars it took to produce it. when shown to Russian audiences in Moscow people watching it, in them knowing what a horror "Uncle Joe" Stalin really was, could't refrain from laughing out load when ever Davies showed his enthusiasm for the Stalin regime as well as "Uncle Joe" himself! Even if it meant a one way ticket to a Siberian gulag or Soviet firing squad if they were ever identified,with the lights in the theater turned on, of showing disrespect to "Uncle Joe" and his "great" accomplishments for the Russian people!
P.S No matter how ridicules and historically inaccurate,in covering up Stalin's crimes, the film "Mission to Moscow" is the one thing it got right is that without the help of the USSR the US and its western allies would have never won the war against Nazi Germany. According to official German casualty statistics the German military lost an astounding 2,400,000 killed and missing together with almost 3,500,000 wounded in the fighting on the Eastern or Russian front alone! And that's only up to November 30, 1944 when the German military stopped keeping casualties statistics! That's without even counting the enormous losses that the German army suffered fighting against the Red Army from December 1944 to the end of the war in May 1945! Those tremendous losses of manpower as well as military equipment against the Soviet Union would have fully equipped and manned as much as 400 Nazi infantry and armored divisions! A German army of almost 6 million strong which could have been thrown against the US Britain and their allies in not only North Africa and Italy but in the savage and bloody battles of Western Europe in 1944/5 which would have well turned the tied of battle in Hitler's favor! In fact there would have been no possibility of a Western Front without an Eastern Front tying down as much as 80% of the German Army needed to engage the advancing some 8 to 10 million strong Red Army!
Given the job as Ambassador to the Soviet Union in 1937 by Pres. Roosevelt, Jack Young, Davies, Walter Huston, is given the assignment to check out what's going on in that country and report back to the president if it will be a reliable ally if a future conflict between Britian & France that breaks out with Nazi Germany. In what seems like no time at all Davies develops a love affair with the USSR and it's ruthless dictator Joseph or "Uncle Joe" as President Roosevelt calls him the Man of Steel himself Joseph V. Stalin played by the kind sweet and fatherly looking Mamart Kipper. The what seems like very naive Davies,who should have known better,is completely blown away by Uncle Joe's "great" accomplishments. That's in him bringing the backward and 19th century Russia into the 20th century with his series of 5 year economic plans. Plans not originated by "Uncle Joe" but his late boss and first leader of the Soviet Union Nickolai 'Nicky" Lennin.
Even though very pro-Stalin the movie surprisingly doesn't skip over the notorious 1937/38 purge trials conducted by Stailn's henchmen in the Soviet Ministry of Justice and the dreaded NKVD. It was at those trials that the almost entire Soviet diplomatic and Red Army office corps were convicted and executed for treason. They were all accused in them planning with the exiled and deposed, by Stalin, Leon Trotsky, Sam Goldenberg, with the Hitler's Germany and Imperial Japan of trying to undermined and overthrow the Stalin regime. As It turned it wasn't treason that they were guilty of but Stalin's hysterical paranoia of feeling threatened by anyone close to him trying to throw him out of power!
The movie goes on making excuse after excuse for Stalin's crimes,like the invasions of Poland Finland and the Baltic States,in that they were needed to get his country ready for the coming invasion by Hitler's Germany which he was certain was soon to come. Yet when the Nazi invasion finally came in June 1941 Stalin's well prepared for it Red Army was caught flat-footed having the German Army reach the very gates of Moscow before the year was out. Davies now back in the US and a private citizen does his best to get the American people, who at the time was very isolationist, ready to both supply the Soviet Union with military hardware as well as join it in it's battle against Germany. But as fate would have it it was japan's sneak attack on Pearl Harbor, six months after Hitler invaded the USSR, that did the trick for both him and President Roosevelt. It was Pres.Roosevelt who's behind the scenes actions was doing everything to incite a German U-Boat attack on US shipping in order to get the US into the war. What was so ironic about that is that it was Hitler's Germany who did everything possible to avoid a conflict with the USA, even having his U-boats not return fire after being fired upon by the US Navy, not the US that was the first to declare war!
Despite the Soviet Union being an ally of the US at the time of the films release it in fact bombed at the box office not even making back half of the 1.5 million dollars it took to produce it. when shown to Russian audiences in Moscow people watching it, in them knowing what a horror "Uncle Joe" Stalin really was, could't refrain from laughing out load when ever Davies showed his enthusiasm for the Stalin regime as well as "Uncle Joe" himself! Even if it meant a one way ticket to a Siberian gulag or Soviet firing squad if they were ever identified,with the lights in the theater turned on, of showing disrespect to "Uncle Joe" and his "great" accomplishments for the Russian people!
P.S No matter how ridicules and historically inaccurate,in covering up Stalin's crimes, the film "Mission to Moscow" is the one thing it got right is that without the help of the USSR the US and its western allies would have never won the war against Nazi Germany. According to official German casualty statistics the German military lost an astounding 2,400,000 killed and missing together with almost 3,500,000 wounded in the fighting on the Eastern or Russian front alone! And that's only up to November 30, 1944 when the German military stopped keeping casualties statistics! That's without even counting the enormous losses that the German army suffered fighting against the Red Army from December 1944 to the end of the war in May 1945! Those tremendous losses of manpower as well as military equipment against the Soviet Union would have fully equipped and manned as much as 400 Nazi infantry and armored divisions! A German army of almost 6 million strong which could have been thrown against the US Britain and their allies in not only North Africa and Italy but in the savage and bloody battles of Western Europe in 1944/5 which would have well turned the tied of battle in Hitler's favor! In fact there would have been no possibility of a Western Front without an Eastern Front tying down as much as 80% of the German Army needed to engage the advancing some 8 to 10 million strong Red Army!