Molotov: The Man Behind the Cocktail (TV)

He was the man who stood next to Stalin: Vyacheslav Molotov. This Molotov, Soviet Foreign Minister for many years, told the world what political decisions had been taken behind the walls of the Kremlin. He dealt with Hitler and Goebbels, negotiated with Roosevelt and Churchill. He was a principal signatory to the historically significant Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, and during the Second World War he became Moscow's emissary to the Allies in the West. He was the only one of Stalin's original inner circle to survive not only the Great Terror of the 1930's but also the death of his political patron in 1953. Molotov remained Foreign Minister after Stalin's death -and a Stalinist-. He was expelled from the Communist Party, but was rehabilitated when he was ninety-four years old. He died two years later, in 1986. The life of this politician is filled with evil, funny, revealingly sad stories - no one else in the 20th Century has been so intrinsic to the history of a state for so long. The image-based style of this documentary suits the elaborate archive material used. In this way the historical facts come to life.