# Movies Where Protagonist is Regretful after the Revolution **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** movies\ **Created:** [April 30, 2023, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-protagonist-is-regretful-after-the-revolution/983370 "2023-04-30T13:37:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![MortSahlFan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/3bc359/32.png) [@MortSahlFan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MortSahlFan)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2023, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-protagonist-is-regretful-after-the-revolution/983370/1 "2023-04-30T13:37:49Z")
There’s many movies about revolutions, from practically any country… I’m looking for a movie where the protagonist (who supported the revolution, maybe even fought) is regretful after the revolution, for whatever reason. Maybe what they fought for didn’t come to fruition, or too slowly, or maybe the character has changed. Also, I don’t necessarily mean the protagonist wants to go back to the colonizer, but it could be. Hell, it would be interesting seeing an American movie like this. A guy who fights to get rid of the English, and later thinks, “We should have stayed with the British” “After the Curfew” Director: Usmar Ismail (Indonesia… becoming independent from the Dutch) [https://youtu.be/69s4MWXpw8Y](https://youtu.be/69s4MWXpw8Y) ---
**Author:** ![crowmanyclouds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crowmanyclouds/32/19884_2.png) [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2023, 1:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-protagonist-is-regretful-after-the-revolution/983370/2 "2023-04-30T13:47:00Z")
> **[Land of the Blind](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_of_the_Blind)** > > Land of the Blind is a 2006 British-American drama film starring Ralph Fiennes, Donald Sutherland, Tom Hollander and Lara Flynn Boyle. > Land of the Blind is a dark political satire, based on several incidents throughout history in which tyrannical rulers were overthrown by new leaders who proved to be just as bad, if not worse, and several such cases are alluded to. The title is taken from the saying, "In the kingdom of the blind, the one-eyed man is king." > Land of the Blind had its world premie... ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2023, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-protagonist-is-regretful-after-the-revolution/983370/3 "2023-04-30T14:03:24Z")
If you want one that’s a little out of left field, there’s _Massacre at Central High_ (1976). ---
**Author:** ![Baal\_Houtham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baal_houtham/32/13604_2.png) [@Baal\_Houtham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baal_Houtham)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2023, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-protagonist-is-regretful-after-the-revolution/983370/4 "2023-04-30T14:10:11Z")
Let’s stick **Bananas** in here (speech by El Presidente, just after the revolution). [El Presidente - YouTube](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=dkYfmRwryQo&pp=ygUTV29vZHkgYWxsZW4gYmFuYW5hcw%3D%3D) ---
**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2023, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-protagonist-is-regretful-after-the-revolution/983370/5 "2023-04-30T16:01:57Z")
Although _Start the Revolution Without Me_ is a comedy about the French revolution, it ends with the heroes realizing that things went wrong. Speaking of the French Revolution, the play/movie _[The Persecution and Assassination of Jean-Paul Marat as Performed by the Inmates of the Asylum of Charenton Under the Direction of the Marquis de Sade](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marat/Sade_(film))_ has the play within a play. set in 1809, relate de Sade’s unhappiness over his role in the revolution and his former support of Marat. ---
**Author:** ![Hampshire](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hampshire/32/4887_2.png) [@Hampshire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hampshire)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2023, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-protagonist-is-regretful-after-the-revolution/983370/6 "2023-04-30T18:17:47Z")
In the Hunger Games series Katniss started to resent supporting the revolution when she could see the leader of the revolution wanted to be another dictator. ---
**Author:** ![Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/q.q.switcheroo/32/5713_2.png) [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.Q.Switcheroo)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2023, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-protagonist-is-regretful-after-the-revolution/983370/7 "2023-04-30T18:30:11Z")
Another example from the stage: Caryl Churchill’s [Light Shining in Buckinghamshire](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Light_Shining_in_Buckinghamshire). ---
**Author:** ![PastTense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pasttense/32/14550_2.png) [@PastTense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PastTense)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2023, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-protagonist-is-regretful-after-the-revolution/983370/8 "2023-04-30T18:52:50Z")
I think a fair number of idealists in the West were thoroughly disillusioned as a result of the Russian Revolution. Anyone think of any movies which reflect this? ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2023, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-protagonist-is-regretful-after-the-revolution/983370/9 "2023-04-30T19:04:50Z")
Not Westerners, but Burnt by the Sun is about a prestigious Russian revolutionary and later Red Army colonel who is caught up in the purges. > **[Burnt by the Sun](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burnt_by_the_Sun)** > > Burnt by the Sun (Russian: Утомлённые солнцем, translit. Utomlyonnye solntsem, literally "wearied by the sun") is a 1994 Russian drama film directed, written, produced and starring by Nikita Mikhalkov and co-wrote by Azerbaijani screenwriter Rustam Ibragimbekov. The film depicts the story of a senior Red Army officer, played by Mikhalkov, and his family during the Great Purge of the late 1930s in the Stalinist Soviet Union. While on vacation with his wife, young daughter, and assorted friends an... ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2023, 1:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-protagonist-is-regretful-after-the-revolution/983370/10 "2023-05-01T13:31:48Z")
It’s not a movie, but Isaac Asimov’s short story “The Dead Past” would seem to fit the idea. ---
**Author:** ![DinoR](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dinor/32/2821_2.png) [@DinoR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DinoR)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2023, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-protagonist-is-regretful-after-the-revolution/983370/11 "2023-05-01T16:12:34Z")
[The French Revolution](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0098238/?ref_=tt_mv_close) - It’s a 6 hour long epic that runs all the way through the Reign of Terror. It’s probably safe to interpret Robespierre as being regretful when he is being led to the guillotine. ---
**Author:** ![YamatoTwinkie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/cc9497/32.png) [@YamatoTwinkie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YamatoTwinkie)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2023, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-protagonist-is-regretful-after-the-revolution/983370/12 "2023-05-01T16:28:49Z")
TV Tropes “Full-Circle Revolution” has quite a few examples of this: > **[Full-Circle Revolution - TV Tropes](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FullCircleRevolution)** > > It's not called a revolution for nothing. This trope refers to when a revolution loses revolutionary zeal and appears to just repeat the pre-revolution business as usual, via self-motivated corruption and bureaucratic inertia. Names and rhetoric …