Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #6183 in DVD
• Released on: 2009-04-13
• Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
• Format: PAL
• Number of discs: 1

Synopsis
1989 was a year of revolution: it marked the collapse of communism in Eastern and Central Europe and an end to an entire way of life for millions of people behind the Iron Curtain. Beginning in Hungary, the retreat from communism picked up speed over the summer when the Poles won an overwhelming victory in free elections over their pro-Soviet rulers. In the fall, East Germany and Czechoslovakia achieved freedom with surprisingly little violence. Only Romania, at the end of the year, witnessed a savage battle in the capital and the summary execution of the most notorious of Eastern Europe's dictators, Nicolae Ceausescu.

Customer Reviews

Why the cuts?
If you're thinking of buying this excellent series, BEWARE! Approximately 25 minutes of material which was shown on television, is inexplicably missing from this DVD release, leaving each part about 8 minutes shorter than the original broadcast.

Revealing (sometimes sad) glimpse of life behind the Iron Curtain
This short series doesn't try to be any sort of definitive history of Eastern Bloc Communism. Instead it offers a fascinating sneaky view of how life was really lived during the postwar decades by normal people behind the Iron Curtain.
Much of the footage is from personal archives, home movies, old photos, newsreels and old photos. It reveals how people actually coped, day to day, in repressive regiemes, sometimes under martial law, often being spied upon and with limited freedoms.

The episodes focus not on Russia itself but three satellite states: East Germany, Czechoslovakia and Romania. The personal footage is interspliced with official films, which show communist propaganda in all its glory -- young adults doing synchronised gymnastics in their thousands -- and the chilling reality of the show trial, where reformers are found guilty of treason before being shot.
The programmes also reveal that many of the ordinary folk felt more secure under the authoritarian governments of the past; they might have been repressed but at least they knew they would get hospital treatment, an education, and housing into their old age. It's chilling to compare this kind of wistful nostalgia with the horrific understanding that in Romania women were denied contraception and forced to have babies; inspected and humiliated every month to make sure they weren't hiding a pregnancy.

Some of this footage is impossibly silly, and makes these old regiemes look ridiculous to modern, Western eyes. But much of it is sinister and scary; the Secret Police who kept one civil rights leader under supervision didn't bother to hide: they had a shed in the field next to his house. A singer who showed support for the rebellious Czech leader during the uprising lost her career when the tanks rolled in again. The Ceausescus destroyed much of their capital city to build a palace to their own glory -- and then they were taken out and shot, when the revolution came.
Hearing from the ordinary people, and the ones who stood up to be counted and thus became more than ordinary people, reveals far more about the truth of life in Communist Europe than we normally perceive from a history book. This series mixes understanding and insight with outright entertainment, and so provides a more interesting perspective than it if were a plainly factual documentary. There are obviously other angles to all of the stories which are told, and this isn't a comprehensive history by any means.
But it is a fascinating insight into 20th century European history, and one which helps to make the current situation in Eastern Europe rather more understandable. Plus it's enjoyable to watch in its on right.
8/10

Mad, Bad & Sad
This is a delightful BBC series (well, three one-hour documentaries) on Communist Germany, Czechoslovakia & Romania, 1945-89. It uses newsreels, film and TV from the communist era to show us the crushing insanity of this political system. I grew up at the height of the Cold War and NOBODY thought the Soviet Union (Communist Russia) would collapse, not with an atomic bang, with a whimper. We had no clue what was going on the other side of the Iron Curtain. These programmes go some way to showing us what life was like in these totalitarian regimes. I loved this series: I only wish there had been more. I would like them to look at Communist Hungary and Soviet Russia.