Song of Russia is a 1944 American war film made and distributed by MGM Studios. The picture was credited as being directed by Gregory Ratoff, though Ratoff collapsed near the end of the five-month production, and was replaced by László Benedek, who completed principal photography; the credited screenwriters were Paul Jarrico and Richard Collins. The film starred Robert Taylor, Susan Peters and Robert Benchley.
The picture was a major studio rele...
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Song of Russia is a 1944 American war film made and distributed by MGM Studios. The picture was credited as being directed by Gregory Ratoff, though Ratoff collapsed near the end of the five-month production, and was replaced by László Benedek, who completed principal photography; the credited screenwriters were Paul Jarrico and Richard Collins. The film starred Robert Taylor, Susan Peters and Robert Benchley.
The picture was a major studio release, perceived as a pro-Soviet propaganda film. The House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) would cite Song of Russia as one of the three noted examples of pro-Soviet films made by Hollywood, the other two being Warner Brothers' Mission to Moscow and RKO's The North Star.
After the fact, Robert Taylor protested that he had had to make the picture under duress, as he was under contract to MGM. This is the rationale he used to explain why he was a friendly witness during the HUAC hearings in the 1950s.
Conductor John Meredith (Robert...
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