First shown in the US in two NYC theaters---Cameo and Continental--- in April, 1938, with Russian dialogue and English titles.

This biography/tribute to Lenin only briefly hints of Leon Trotsky's "treachery" and brings Josef Stalin in for a build-up and was hailed as factual and historically accurate in the US trade-paper reviews of the time, a definition that may or may not hold true in retrospect.

Dirctor Mikhail Romm was also said to have provided the film with suspense...and sympathetic characterizations. The suspense part was the mark of a good director...the sympathetic characterizations may have been because the director had no other choice.