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[narrator] In the pandemonium of the First World War,

the Russia of the Tsars that had seemed to be eternal,

Official YIFY movies site: YTS.MX

now bled dry by battles and tortured by hunger,

is gripped by revolution.

For an entire people, hope is reborn.

But the dream will not last.

As chaos spreads across the country

a handful of men seize power

and change the destiny of mankind.

Posterity only remembers the October Revolution,

but has forgotten that the one that took place in February

could have led Russia to a different destiny.

Men make history, but they don't know the history they make.

For nearly three years,

the Great War has cast its shadow over Europe.

On the Eastern Front,

Imperial Russia is fighting Germany and the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

Enemy offensives have wiped out many of Russia's troops.

There are hundreds of thousands of casualties.

The army of the Tsar, long believed to be invincible,

soon shows signs of weakness.

There are shortages of shells, ammunition and equipment.

In London and in Paris, the Allies are beginning to doubt

whether Russia can hold out in these conditions.

Then, one morning,

news from the Russian capital only increases their anxiety.

[man] Petrograd, 19th of February.

These last few days there have been endless queues at the bakeries.

There's a shortage of flour.

You can hear the crowds complaining.

The women are shivering with cold,

the children are passing out.

[narrator] Since the start of the conflict,

Claude Anet, the correspond to the newspaper Le Petit Parisien,

has been describing in his columns the mood of the city of the Tsars.

Witness to these alarming scenes,

the French journalist hasn't the slightest inkling

that they are the precursors to the greatest upheaval of the 20th century.

Only yesterday,

foreign observers were speaking of Imperial Russia

as an invulnerable giant.

With 14 million men under arms,

she stood as a rock for her allies.

In a Europe swept by war,

the Romanov dynasty, in power for three centuries,

manifested complete confidence in the face of adversity.

Power and stability had attracted investors.

Day after day, with the influx of capital,

factories sprang from the earth.

In just a few years,

Russia had entered the modern era.

-[wind howling] -[coughing]

But this sudden development conceals hidden realities.

-[baby crying] -[bell tolling]

[women chattering]

Despite the colossal production of the agricultural land,

the farmers can barely survive.

Having just emerged from centuries of serfdom,

they slave away in filth, poverty, and cholera.

Nicholas II, Tsar of all the Russias,

is lord and master of his 160 million subjects.

His only concession to the times is the creation of a parliament,

the Duma.

An assembly of prominent citizens devoid of power in the face of his,

which has no bounds.

The Tsar has deprived his country of any political life.

[gunfire]

He systematically uses violent means to put down popular uprisings.

[people screaming]

His will is law.

[gunfire continues]

At the beginning of 1917,

those opposing the regime

waged their political struggle from abroad.

Lev Davidovich Bronstein,

whose nom de guerre was Leon Trotsky,

has escaped from Siberia.

Deported from several European countries

because of his pacifist convictions,

he has settled in the United States.

He tirelessly militates

for the union of proletariats throughout the world.

Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov,

known as Lenin, has found haven in Switzerland.

An international figure of Marxist philosophy,

he has been fighting autocracy for 30 years.

His entire being is devoted to a single aim,

a single idea, a single passion:

revolution.

And yet, it is in the imperial capital,

the St. Petersburg of today,

that history is about to change.

From either side of the River Neva,

two worlds confront each other.

On the south side, beats the heart of the power,

while the workers' suburbs are on the north.

Revolutions begin with bread.

Petrograd has enough supplies for just another ten days.

The time for rationing is at hand.

[Anet] Petrograd, 20th of February.

Things are going no better.

In the early hours of an icy dawn,

my cook waited four hours to get two bread rolls.

Following the severe transport crisis,

not enough coal is getting through.

The factories working for national defense

have had to cut production or close down.

[narrator] It is the fear of the future that lights the powder keg.

[man] Comrades, if we cannot obtain

an honest loaf of bread,

we will solve our problem by force, if necessary.

[narrator] The unrest spreads.

And very soon overwhelms the district.

The gray hordes from the suburbs

surge toward the heart of the city,

demanding emergency measures.

[train chugging]

Everyone is expecting a reaction from the Tsar,

but the Tsar is in Mogilev,

more than 700 kilometers from Petrograd.

Nicholas II has taken over command of military operations,

to inspire his troops.

He believes that war can still unite his people around the Crown,

whereas, in fact, it stirs up tension and rancor.

In his absence,

the Empress Alexandra deluges her husband with reassuring letters.

The unrest does not concern her in the slightest.

But in the capital,

new disturbances are brewing.

To stem them,

the bridges that link the two parts of the city are raised.

The working-class suburbs are cut off from the town center.

But the authorities have overlooked one detail,

at this time of year, the Neva freezes over.

And on International Women's Day,

thousands of wives, mothers, and daughters

walk across the frozen river

to parade through the upper-class districts.

The next day, the 24th of February, the demonstrations swell.

Factories go on strike,

more than 200,000 people take to the streets.

The protests take on a decidedly political tone.

[typewriter keys clacking]

[Anet] Hundreds of groups are gathering,

meetings are improvised.

[shouting]

Outside the station orators harangue the crowd,

shouting, "Down with the government!"

"Down with the war!"

I'm even hearing, "Down with the Tsar."

The situation can change at any minute and become serious.

[narrator] The revolution is underway.

Far from Petrograd, in the headquarters of the armed forces,

Nicholas II has just received an irate letter from the Tsarina.

[Alexandra] My love, what frightful times we live in!

Lowborn girls are running around shouting that they have no bread,

simply to create a disturbance.

At the same time, some workers are preventing others from working.

God has given you a very heavy cross to bear,

but stand firm.

Show your authority. That's what the Russians need.

Let them feel the weight of your fist.

[narrator] The Tsar is determined to settle the problem from a distance.

His telegram is categorical.

[Nicholas II] I have ordered the disturbances

to be put down by force before tomorrow.

[narrator] So the army and the police now resist the demonstrators

who refuse to disperse.

The soldiers open fire.

The crowds panic and run.

[gunfire]

There are many dead and wounded.

Very quickly, the center of Petrograd takes on the appearance

of a camp under siege.

That night,

in Petrograd's barracks, feelings are running high.

Most of the soldiers are small farmers or laborers,

forced by the war to serve under the banner of the Tsar.

One after another,

shocked at having been ordered to fire at their brothers,

they mutiny and join the ranks of the insurgents.

[chattering]

Cut off from the real world,

the Tsar disregards the alarming telegrams

that his general staff receive from the capital.

[all cheering]

On the morning of the 27th of February,

the French journalist is transfixed by the scenes in the street.

[Anet] There is nonstop shooting.

The soldiers are firing in the air.

-[all shouting] -[gunfire]

They're heading for the nearby arsenal and I'm following them.

They're laying siege to it.

I can see them giving guns to the workers.

[narrator] Around 40,000 rifles and 30,000 revolvers are handed out.

[train whistle blowing]

The same day,

Nicholas II at last makes up his mind to return to the capital,

determined to quell the rebellion.

But the imperial train can't get through.

Using destroyed bridges and unusable tracks as a pretext,

the railway workers keep re-routing the train.

Meanwhile, in Petrograd, Nicholas II's power is crumbling.

Beneath the golden tints of the Tauride Palace,

the members of the Duma rise up against the Tsar.

During an extraordinary session,

they declare their autonomy.

In a neighboring hall, soldiers and workers form an assembly.

As an emergency measure,

they elect 600 delegates to represent them,

the Petrograd Soviet.

That evening, in a wave of enthusiasm,

all these men forge their destiny.

[Anet] 28th of February, outside the entrance to the Tauride Palace

the crowd is so dense that I can hardly get through.

[crowd cheers]

Here I am at the center of the Russian Revolution.

Armed soldiers everywhere, a few civilians.

One of them said to me,

"Do you see all that we've done in one day?"

[gunfire]

-[all cheering] -[Anet] Immense joy everywhere.

[narrator] From now on, there is no longer any support for the Tsar.

He is still blocked in his train in the middle of the steppes.

Worse still, aware that a page has been turned,

his general staff encourage him to abdicate for the good of Russia.

Resigned to the situation, Nicholas II gives up the throne.

It's a triumph for the revolution.

[all cheering]

The will of the people has just made history.

In New York, for Leon Trotsky, revolution means amnesty.

He enthusiastically sets sail to go back home.

But his return to war-torn Europe will take longer than expected.

And on the banks of Lake Zurich, where he takes his stroll everyday,

Lenin exclaims when he hears the news.

[Lenin] Amazing! Incredible!

So unexpected.

[narrator] Convinced that this first stage of the Revolution will not be the last,

he decides he must return home at all costs,

but who is expecting him in Russia?

[narrator] For now, Petrograd is mourning its dead.

[bell tolls]

February's victims are buried in the heart of the capital.

One million people have come to pay their last respects.

On this first public holiday of the new Russia,

all the actors of the revolution have answered the call.

Conservatives and socialists,

aristocrats and commoners,

have all contributed to overturning a regime

that thought itself eternal.

But now they have to govern.

And under the dome of the Tauride Palace,

reconcile two visions of the future.

On one side, there are the members of the Duma

who want a Russia that is capitalist and liberal.

On the other, there is the new assembly

that has come out of the revolution, the Soviet.

With a socialist majority,

its delegates aspire to a world of justice and equality.

After lengthy negotiations, the two sides agreed to form

a provisional government with a liberal majority.

Alexander Kerensky, a moderate-socialist

is the main architect of this compromise.

Named Minister of Justice,

he is the man that the revolution throws up out of the ranks.

His ambition will do the rest.

This government's primary aim is simple:

to establish liberty.

Decree number one is immediately enacted.

The abolition of corporal punishment in the army

gives back the soldier his dignity.

From being a subject, he becomes a full citizen.

On the front, the men celebrate their new status.

In a few weeks, spectacular measures are put into place.

They break definitively with the old ways.

Freedom of association, of expression,

of the press, a general amnesty,

abolition of the death penalty,

universal suffrage.

Everywhere, people's councils are set up.

There is no town in Russia without its Soviet

where the population expresses its grievances

and sets out its demands.

The country dreams of being the freest in the world.

The mosaic of oppressed peoples that had composed the empire

are now demanding autonomy.

In the countryside, the peasants rejoice.

They claimed the right to a plot of land

large enough to feed the mouths living on it.

The promise of a better life is emerging for the working class too.

Soon, wages would no longer be miserable,

40 hours of work a week will become the rule,

and job security would be guaranteed.

In the spring of 1917,

the banners proclaim,

"For a democratic republic,

for peace,

for the land and power to the people."

Hope is boundless.

At the end of March,

a train leaves Zurich, carrying a man toward his destiny.

Onboard, Lenin.

He is firmly opposed to war,

this imperialist war that was massacring

the proletariat of the entire world with its machine guns.

His forced exile has fed his doctrine,

forged his patience and hardened his determination.

The hour has finally come

for him to enter the arena.

[Anet] The famous Lenin arrived last night in Petrograd.

He is the reddest of the reds.

Lenin wants peace

without delay

and under any conditions.

This is the idea he has come to defend in Russia.

[narrator] The very next day, Lenin presents his program to the Soviet.

Although his prestige is great,

his party, the Bolshevik Party, is in a minority.

It has barely 5,000 militants in Petrograd

for two million inhabitants.

Before the assembly, his slogans strike a blow.

[Lenin] Down with the war.

[narrator] Because it's a capitalist war.

[Lenin] Down with the provisional government.

[narrator] It is a bourgeois government.

[Lenin] All power to the Soviets.

[narrator] Therefore, to the people.

The audience is stunned,

including his own followers.

Lenin is alone.

And for good reason.

His program, too radical, frightens people.

The members of the Soviet

want first to implement the democratic project

they and the liberals have committed themselves to.

And of course, the war has to continue.

But not under any conditions.

The Soviet wants to force the government

to renegotiate the treaties drawn up between the Tsar and the Allies,

so that they respected the right of peoples to self-determination.

The crisis is so violent

that it results in the creation of a new government.

An unprecedented cohabitation

between socialists and liberals is created to lead Russia.

Appointed Minister of War,

the ambitious Alexander Kerensky continues his rise.

And to reassure the Allies, he takes a risky gamble.

Faced with a doubtful general staff,

he decides to launch a major offensive against the Germans.

On the 18th of June, the Russian army attacks.

But the enthusiasm is short-lived.

The Russian army is humiliated.

The resounding defeat paralyzes the government.

Helpless, the ministers undertake no reforms

and merely deal with urgent matters.

For the impatient population,

this longed for revolution is proving slow to keep its promises.

In Petrograd, revolt is in the air.

[crowd clamoring]

The most diverse convictions are expressed from one quarter to another.

On Nevsky Prospekt,

the anarchists are exhorting people to loot the banks.

Farther away, Ukrainian nationalists are demanding independence.

In Vyborg, cradle of the February Revolution,

the workers who have imposed an eight-hour working day

now want to control hiring and firing.

[shouting in Russian]

Meanwhile, at the Bolsheviks' headquarters,

now transformed into a fortress,

Lenin relentlessly harangues the crowds with conviction.

They thought he was finished, but he is still combative.

Bourgeois Revolution is at an impasse.

In these troubled days, Lenin moves his pawns forward.

After numerous incidents,

Lenin manages to escape from the Allies,

who dreaded they would see this notorious pacifist turn up in Russia.

Almost as soon as he arrives,

Trotsky chooses to rejoin the Bolshevik radicals.

Trotsky, who could have been a formidable competitor to Lenin

becomes his brilliant second

and an indispensable ally.

Day after day, the ideas of this little party gain ground,

as repeatedly proclaimed by their newspaper, Pravda.

On the front, Bolshevik beliefs find an echo.

[Anet] Pravda has found a new way of obtaining the much-desired peace.

This is fraternization of Russian soldiers with German soldiers.

[whistle blowing]

Leaving the trenches to go over to the enemy trenches.

Why continue fighting?

Hasn't the war lasted long enough?

Let's embrace. We're brothers.

Let's drink our brandy together and talk about peace.

This is the touching and shameful spectacle

which the Bolsheviks are inviting us to see.

[chattering, laughing]

[narrator] To put a stop to this subversive movement,

the government decides to act.

But it is to make a mistake, a big one.

At the beginning of July,

the 1st Machine Gun Regiment of Petrograd,

who have been won over by Bolshevik ideas,

are summoned to the front.

Heroes of the February Revolution,

they had, however, been given a guarantee not to be called into battle again.

Disgusted, the regiment refuses to obey,

and threatens to overthrow the government.

[marching band playing]

Petrograd is feeling the fevers of February.

Thousands of armed men, joined by workers' committees,

cross the city, ready to fight.

After months of frustration,

it is time for this revolution to go into action.

One single word from Lenin, and the government would fall.

Against all expectations, Lenin calls for moderation.

In private, he says…

[Lenin] If we were now capable of taking power,

it would be naive to think we should be able to keep it.

We must not rush things.

Time is on our side.

[narrator] Confused, demonstrators spread in disorder through the city center.

On Nevsky Prospekt,

gunfire from the rooftops fired by troops loyal to the government,

provokes panic.

[gunfire]

The government recovers

and begins looking for the troublemakers.

[horses whinny]

Bolshevik militants are arrested.

The party has lost its leaders.

Trotsky is imprisoned in the Peter and Paul Fortress.

Accused of high treason and pursued,

Lenin disguises himself and manages to escape to Finland.

Three months after his return to Russia,

he is in exile once again.

[crowd clamoring]

The chaos propels Kerensky to the head of a new government.

He still enjoys huge popularity.

But the socialist Kerensky

will now have to deal with the demands of the liberals.

Order must be reestablished.

At all costs.

To meet these demands, he instigates authoritarian measures.

Restoration of the death penalty for deserters,

limitation of the rights of soldiers' committees.

But to no avail.

The government is unable to enforce them.

[shouting in Russian]

On the front, between July and October,

more than two million starving and battle-worn soldiers desert.

But if Russian soldiers are leaving the front in droves

it is also because an insistent rumor is spreading.

The distribution of land is about to begin.

From the four corners of the empire,

the peasants who had enlisted in the army,

do not want to arrive back in their village

too late to get their share.

And yet, the promised agrarian reform is still not in sight.

So, the villagers decide to implement it themselves,

in their own way.

Here, they requisition the livestock.

[mooing]

There, they refuse to hand over the harvest.

The plundering of the great estates multiplies.

The revolution is turning into anarchy.

Far from Petrograd, reaction is brewing in Moscow.

The business community, the industrialists,

the great landowners, and the union of officers,

all of them consider that the revolution has gone too far.

It is time to end it.

At the end of August, it is a military figure who takes charge.

A general with an iron fist, Lavr Kornilov.

A disciplinarian who masters his troops,

he has had deserters shot

and has abolished soldiers' committees.

He, too, wants order to return-- in order, as he says,

"To save Russia."

The specter of a military dictatorship is emerging.

Kornilov sends his Cossacks to the capital.

Addressing the danger,

Kerensky dismisses the general from his duties.

To retain control, Kerensky mobilizes all the partisans of the revolution,

including his former rivals, the Bolsheviks.

[speaking Russian]

Liberated from prison, they activate their clandestine networks.

Railroad workers divert military trains and dismantle rails.

Switchboard operators block communications.

[lines ringing]

The troops in Petrograd take up their positions to defend the city.

But the confrontation never takes place.

Kornilov's troops refuse to fight their brothers in arms

and eventually lay down their weapons.

In a few days, the movement has been reduced to nothing.

The counter-revolution has had its day.

By the late summer of 1917,

Russia is gradually sinking.

The economy is practically at a standstill.

What now remains of the hopes of February?

[Anet] Discouragement is everywhere.

The greater the hopes had been of freedom,

the deeper is the disappointment of seeing that the country is, at present,

incapable of governing itself.

Eight months of revolution have left Russia overwhelmed.

[narrator] Among the population, despair has reached its height.

And another revolution is in the making.

In October, though still wanted by the police,

Lenin returns secretly to Petrograd.

Until then, he had been playing against the clock.

But the time has now come to act.

Previously, Leon Trotsky had been made president of the Soviet of Petrograd.

[all cheering]

For his part, Kerensky is trying to revive the democratic process.

A council is created to prepare for the elections.

True to the spirit of February, all factions are represented.

But at the first meeting, Trotsky, at the head of the Bolshevik delegation,

refuses to take part in the debates and walks out of the assembly.

[typewriter keys clacking]

[Anet] Trotsky has broken with the other socialist factions.

One can feel and one knows that Lenin is behind him.

Doesn't everyone know that Lenin, the god Lenin, has returned to Petrograd,

where he is hardly bothering to hide?

What has he to fear from Kerensky?

Lenin and Trotsky have understood the worthlessness of their opponents.

The uselessness of conferences, of pre-parliaments,

of the endless chatter in the halls where the new democracy meets.

[shouting in Russian]

[narrator] To the soldiers worn out by war,

the Bolsheviks proposed peace.

To the starving peasants, they promised land.

And to the proletariat, they offer workers' control of industry.

Promises that would, henceforth, respond to the aspirations of the masses.

But they still have to find a way to seize power.

In the utmost secrecy,

Lenin brings together the leadership of the Bolshevik Party.

[speaking Russian]

He convinces a majority to launch an armed insurrection.

But time is short.

The congress of all the Soviets of Russia

is due to be held at the end of October in Petrograd.

And Lenin doesn't want to include other Socialist factions

in governing the destiny of the country.

[Lenin] It would be naive to wait until the Bolsheviks

have a formal majority.

No revolution ever waits for that.

History will not forgive us if we do not take power now.

[narrator] In mid-October, in spite of the freezing northerly wind,

Nevsky Prospekt is teeming with people.

Among the bustling crowd,

no one pays any attention to the little groups of workers,

of soldiers, of sailors.

Secretly, they have been carrying out reconnaissance missions for several days.

Nobody suspects they are rehearsing a very carefully worked out scenario.

It is no longer a matter of provoking a popular insurrection,

but of conducting a military operation.

Trotsky has conceived a plan which relies on speed of execution

to occupy strategic locations in the capital,

and thus, to seize power in all of Russia.

On October 24th, 1917, operations begin.

Each group knows its objective.

At the agreed time, they launch the attack.

Postal, telephone, and telegraphic centers,

banks, rail, and power stations.

One after another, the targets fall under their control.

No one in Petrograd realizes what's at stake.

Not even Claude Anet.

[Anet] 11:00 p.m., silence reigns over the city.

No one can imagine what the silence of Petrograd is like.

It's sepulchral, palpable,

alarming,

and in the end,

it overwhelms you.

[narrator] Trotsky's plan is carried out with the utmost secrecy,

and with no violence.

The capital is in the hands of the Bolsheviks.

Kerensky has lost the game.

The next day, disguised as a Serbian officer,

he manages to get out of the capital in a diplomatic car.

[chattering]

On the other side of the city,

the Congress of the Soviets of Russia opens session.

[speaking Russian]

The majority of delegates--

socialists, revolutionaries, Mensheviks, or labor alike--

condemn the overthrow.

They immediately leave the room.

The remaining members of Congress

then validate the creation of a new government,

the Council of Peoples' Commissars.

[all cheering]

At its head, Lenin.

[Lenin] Starting the worldwide revolution in Russia

was as easy as picking up a feather.

[all cheering]

[typewriter keys clacking]

[Anet] The great day, I was there.

And of all the surprises of the revolution,

it showed me the most surprising.

Here is what I saw.

On the corner of the Moyka, a group of soldiers passed by me.

They were marching in perfect order, like they used to in the old regime.

Totally calm. Not one gunshot was heard.

I was arrested by soldiers and sailors.

These are Trotsky's Military Revolutionary Committee troops.

They are masters of the whole city,

and they are imposing an order on it

that we haven't seen since the beginning of the revolution,

and which takes us back to the times of the Tsars' autocracy.

Staying in Petrograd seems risky to me.

Freedom being the most precious thing to own, I'm leaving.

[narrator] In October 1917,

the minority that took power

still represents the aspirations of the Russian people.

In Petrograd, a new world is being shaped.

All over the world, it excites the proletariat.

Everyone dreams of breaking their chains.

It engenders a giant,

determined to spread the flame of revolution to all countries.

In the East, a great light is rising to illuminate the hope of all peoples.

It will also burn them in the flames of its passion.

[cheering, whistling]