Films > Revolt of the Fishermen

Above: Erwin Piscator.
'I once saw a Russian film about a revolt of some fishermen ... A shark was netted with a shoal of other fish and killed ... This struck me as a pretty good symbol of the Nazi system which, even though dead, continues to go on swallowing live struggling men and women!'
'It would do just as well for any other system ... Including the Communist system.' – UTV, p 304-5.

Revolt of the Fishermen (1925, dir. Erwin Piscator) was based on the 1929 novella by Anna Seghers. When the fishermen of Santa Barbara demand a better wage scale and a larger share of their catch, outsiders are brought in by the shipowners in a successful attempt to break the strike. Both the film and the novella warn against fascism, calling for a united opposition in the form of the striking fishermen and the strike breakers.

The failed strike appeals to Hugh in the same manner as the Spanish Civil War – a doomed enterprise for a worthy cause.