This "official" Soviet film reverses the attitudes of Andrei Startsov, the hero in the novel of Konstantin Fedin. In the book, Startsov was skeptical of the benefits of the oncoming Russian Revolution and of Bolshevism. In this version, he is attracted to the left, and becomes an active participant in the Bolshevik revolution and assumes a position of leadership in the Red Army. This reversal exacts a kind of revenge for the anti-Soviet attitudes of the novel and the 1920s filmed version of it. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi