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SOME BACKGROUND INFO
(Script & list of characters will be posted soon) Also see research images

Kronstadt is a Russian Naval base on Kotlin Island off the coast of Finland about twenty miles west of Petrograd. The Kronstadt Sailors had a long tradition as courageous fighters beginning with the failed revolution of 1905 (the subject of Battleship Potemkin,directed by Sergei Eisenstein, 1925) and continuing through the Bolshevik revolution in 1917 to the uprising in 1921.The sailors had a reputation for loathing privilege and authority and saw no need for central government. They grew community gardens,practiced direct democracy through popular assemblies, and operated a free university in the town square.

While they had a reputation for ferocity and had no qualms using force when they deemed it necessary, the 1921 uprising was intended to be non-violent. Strikes had broken out at a mill in nearby Petrograd. The strikers were refusing to work until their demands were met for increased food rations and shoes, if available. The Bolsheviks refused to make concessions to the workers and locked the workers out of the factory thus denying them access to food rations, and the strike spread quickly throughout the city. As the strikes spread the demands became more political. The sailors of Kronstadt were disturbed with what was happening in Petrograd and came out in support of the strikers. They drafted resolution seizing the opportunity to implement much needed reform to the Bolshevik government which at that time was falling short of its revolutionary promises and furthermore, was no longer able to justify its actions under the special conditions of War Communism as the civil war had come to an end.

The resolution alarmed those in power because it voiced the concerns of the peasant population, and at that time the Bolsheviks were struggling to maintain control without popular support. They labeled the sailors as counter revolutionaries while their resolution would actually institute the very revolutionary promises that the Bolshevik government was failing to fulfill. The government launched a propaganda campaign utilizing the newspapers as well as distributing leaflets and was successful in turning even the strikers against the sailors. Justified by this misinformation campaign, Trotsky ordered the sailors to be killed. The sailors defended their fort for two weeks until they were finally defeated by the Red Army troops.

With the current war in Iraq we can see a similar strategy used: a war is justified by labeling the opponents as terrorists, and the media becomes a tool to convey this message. By using language similar to today’s political rhetoric to discuss the sailor’s predicament, the film draws a parallel between the current Bush administration and the communist dictatorship of post-revolutionary Soviet Union. To an audience who grew up thinking USSR was the antithesis of the American way, this sends a clear message about our current state of affairs. By telling the story as an allegory we are able to see the current situation objectively: the media, owned by those in power, is used as a propaganda tool by the government who’s objective is to maintain control at the expense of human life.

Maggots and Men recounts some of the important events that occurred in March of 1921 including the radio announcement celebrating national women’s day that one sailor took time to make while they were under assault. Scenes include the strikes in Petrograd, community gardens, peaceful life on the island, as well as the sailors drafting the resolution and presenting it to the un welcoming congress. The film will also include fabricated events imagined by the scriptwriters, primarily, a love story of the protagonist and another sailor that unfolds as a conflict between the two as one is completely consumed by their love affair while the other is consumed with the political struggle.

****The scene that is to be shot in Vermont is the Red Army advancing across the frozen ocean towards Kronstadt. During the first few attempts to cross the ice many of the troops were killed by their own superiors for refusing to fight as they saw the Kronstadt sailors as justified in their actions and brothers in the revolutionary struggle.

****Women actors will be used in Strikes and at the congressional hearing where the sailors present the resolution.

Check out the film Battleship Potemkin for more visual info (Eisenstein, 1925).