AllMovie

Poet and Tsar is loosely based on Alexander Pushkin's autobiographical work A Voyage to Arzum. D. Zhuraviev plays the young Pushkin, who pursues truth at all costs in his poems and essays, even unto openly defying Czar Nicholas I. Abused and persecuted by the Romanov regime, Pushkin persists in spreading his revolutionary ideals throughout Russia, amassing a loyal band of followers equally willing to suffer the slings and arrows of oppression. This sequel to 1937's Young Pushkin ends inconclusively, suggesting that still another sequel may have been in the works. Poet and Tsar was one of several films commissioned by Josef Stalin to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the October Revolution.