Review of Reds (1981) by Mikael K — 16 Oct 2010

Warren Beatty's ambitious epic illuminates the life of John Reed, an American liberal socialist who was involved in the first days of the Bolshevik Revolution. The film starts by exploring Reed's motives and ideology and how it emerged from and through his journalism and poetry. We sarte presented with a strong idealist and intellectual who was determined to help turn humanity into something more noble.

Reed is played by Beatty himself, and he ownes the role. Diane Keaton successfully portrays Louise Bryant, Reed's love interest of her own revolutionary and femisnist convictions. The couple bring a healthy dose of honest human drama into a film that might otherwise feel too stuffy, dry and political. But the politics and the historical context are definitely what carries â??Redsâ??. It's delightfully contemplative and multifaceted in the way it shows the birth of the Soviet Union and the sympathy the working class of America initially felt for the revolutionaries. It's quite heartbreaking when Reed ultimately realizes that the ideology he has believed in with all his intellect is being used to set up a totalitarian system that does an excellent job in opressing the weak.

One thing I have to mention is that- as the film was shot during the cold war- all the Moscow scenes have been shot in my beautiful home city of Helsinki. I had no idea it could be made to look so very authentically Russian!