A country racked by war, deprivation and famine, ruled by a dictatorial regime that robbed artists of all freedom – that was how British philosopher and historian Isaiah Berlin saw the Soviet Union of his day. Sergei Eisenstein embraced that regime and became a film director who would revolutionise the language of cinema and enjoy international acclaim. In this very personal docu-drama of the 20th century, Davis Simanis shows us what linked the two very different men. Like the director himself, his protagonists were born in Riga. Simanis knowledgeably and with humour documents how both men left the city behind them and went on to leave their stamp on their era, before meeting each other years later in Moscow. In re-enactments along the way, we encounter Charlie Chaplin, Sigmund Freud, Josef Stalin and the great Russian poet Anna Akhmatova.