From reality, it's only that the prototypes of the tank actually traveled from Kharkov to Moscow on their own, that their creator really sat behind the levers of one of the tanks.
Yep.
That much is true. Verifiable, documented, true.
The rest is fiction.
For those who find the reality interesting, here are some tasty treats:
Kotin did the whole thing as a bit of a PR stunt. And not to leave anything half-done, he had an "Album" created of the trip. I managed to lay my digital hands on a copy. Here is the "album" cover art.
And the title page. Clearly from someone's personal collection. Unhappily, my limited Russian reading skills find hand-written script no easier than my face finds a wall. When I run into it, I am stopped cold.
I will suggest this much. I believe the movie production team had this album in their hands when they made the movie. Too many scenes, even in the trailer, look like they came straight out of the album. If any of our Russian speaking members can decode the script, I would be quite interested to know how these pictures, and even more how the next pictures, are described.
I can see using images like this, with the tank having flames on front and back, to spur a flight of fantasy about what the trip "actually" involved. I have looked closely at the whole album and can not see anyone with an umbrella on any of the grassy knolls.
These are the pages I have worked most to decode. This page seems to describe the characteristics of the tank -- a sort of overview of the specs. (I had thought at first that it might be a mechanic's log or some such.) It is followed by detailed pictures of various components used in the tank. So the whole thing was clearly NOT a remembrance / keepsake for those who made the trip, but rather a sort of PR brochure for those Kotin wanted to influence.
The story line about Germans trying to ambush, steal, shoot up or burn the tank, or whatever, are non-sense. Russia was not at war with Germany at that time. Quite to the contrary, Russia was supplying large quantities of vital raw materials to feed the German war machine, although clearly both sides viewed the other as a future adversary.
So why take a story with real events as it's starting point, and extend it into pure fiction? Well, because that's what movie-makers do. Have we never seen movies like "The Battle of the Bulge", "Inglorious Basterds" or "Saving Private Ryan"?
-Mark
(aka: Mk 1)
goes to sea with the Terrain Mat.
