Growing up in the 1950s and 1960s in downstate Illinois, my grade school and secondary education exposure to Communism was minimal at best—though I recall how Dewey School suddenly invested in weekly science reading material after Sputnik was launched and abruptly brought in a new reading program that bumped me up two grades to rub shoulders with the sixth graders. Mostly we got drilled with fear mongering and scare tactics—from diving under our desks to avoid nuclear bombs to hearing Jack Webb’s ominous voice describing how we’d live a prisoner lifestyle should the evil Reds take over our neighborhoods. To ensure that we’d carry on American ideals of the free market and capitalism, my civics teacher would assign articles from U.S. News & World Report—like one bashing the welfare program.

It wasn’t until my University of Illinois days that I began to see classmates exploring Communism—flirting with trappings like Che Guevara T-shirts and posters or more seriously delving into Marxism through books and classes. Although many of its socialistic ideals appealed, I never dove into the subject deeply since both the U.S. and Soviet political systems appeared equally flawed on a pragmatic basis. Besides, even showing intellectual curiosity in Marxism made you suspicious in the eyes of the government—not a beneficial situation for an aspiring teacher.

Times have changed radically since those paranoid years of the Cold War, however, and information is more readily available. And that’s a good thing. A most promising development is the fascinating French documentary Faith of the Century: A History of Communism that offers an excellent overview of how Communism spread from the end of WWI and greatly influenced the 20th century over seven decades. Written by Patrice Chereau, the English narrative is dry (and contains occasional 2nd language quirks) but thoroughly engrossing for such an educational vehicle designed more suitably for The History Channel than for entertainment.

Rare archival footage, photographs, and propaganda film sequences from behind the Iron Curtain illumine the ideology that dominated much of the world for much of the century and that still continues in China, Cuba, Vietnam, and other countries today. Based on concepts about an egalitarian and classless society, the theory behind Communism proved very seductive, and the documentary clearly demonstrates how the totalitarian regime of Stalin manipulated the Soviet people by hiding the truth and using ideals proclaimed by Lenin, Marx, and Engels to achieve his agenda. Thus, Communism became widespread and grew like a religion among its adherents.

The footage is frequently jaw dropping—previously unavailable footage of Lenin and Stalin dominate, but other priceless moments include Ho Chi Min speaking in Red Square in 1924 and a youthful Mao Zedong as he begins his 20 year trek towards power. Incredibly, there are even scenes featuring Hitler that haven’t appeared before in the many documentaries about Nazism and WWII.

Keeping its citizens in the dark through authoritarian means appears to be a key factor for maintaining governmental power under Communism. That explains why China continues to thrive while the Soviet Union crumbled over time, beginning with Khruschev’s revelations about Stalin’s abuses and ending with Gorbachev’s reformatory declarations of perestroika and glasnost. Divided into four programs, the documentary can be viewed in palatable sections easily adapted for classroom use: "1917-1928 - Utopia in Power," "1929-1939 - Communism: The Two Faces," "1940-1953 - The Peak Years," and "1954-1993 - End Without End."

The important French documentary scores best in the first three sections when dealing with its primary focus of Soviet style Communism; the denouement section plays more like an outline since it splinters into so many sections to cover the Cold War period with expansion into new countries while its authority changes and rapidly declines in the Soviet Union. That chapter still provides a worthwhile overview, but the period warrants further development.

Designed for a limited audience Faith of the Century serves as a dynamic introduction to Communism, giving viewers incomparable portraits of its key figures and showing how the working class of the Soviet Union was lured into accepting it for so many decades before the inevitable disillusionment of the late 1980s. History teachers will find this an invaluable resource well worth its investment.