Strike is a film from highly-influential director Sergei Eisenstein, who was part of the early Soviet Cinema movement. Starring the Proletkult Workers theatre it's about a worker who is wrongfully accused of stealing a micrometer and therefore commits suicide out of humiliation. The workers organise a strike and a committee is set up to organise the strike, which sadly leads to deadly consequences. The story is set in 1912 under the Czarist dictatorship.
One of Eisensteins ideas he put to film was to abolish art because of it's uselessness and based his other ideas for film towards socialist ideas which he succeeded.
The film soundtrack makes the film all the more powerful combining class struggle with a classical score and the final scenes of chapter's 5 & 6 become more disturbing and frought the more you watch them. The film ends with the armed calvalry firing indiscriminatly at the striking workers and ends with "never forget....workers".
Eisenstein's vision of film also influenced modern day director's like Martin Scorcese and his use of visual effects are quite stunning and revolutionary. He died in 1945 after a row with Stalin.
Strike, along with Battleship Potemkin and October have become cult classics on student campuses, especially when Marxist ideas were gaining popularity during the 1970's (socialist ideas are gaining an interest, especially Karl Marx).
So to sum up, Strike is a film of striking genius, Visually arresting and definetly worth watching. Watch and enjoy.
