The Chekist is a 1992 Russian-French historical drama film directed by Aleksandr Rogozhkin, based on a 1923 short story by Vladimir Zazubrin. It tells the story of a bloody work and downfall of a Soviet Cheka security official involved in mass executions during the Russian Civil War. It was screened in the Un Certain Regard section at the 1992 Cannes Film Festival.

Plot

The film is set during the Russian Civil War in the period of the Red Terror. In a provincial Cheka (the All-Russian Emergency Commission for Combating Counter-Revolution and Sabotage) office in an unnamed small town, routine bureaucratic work is taking place. Every day, a Cheka troika tribunal made of director Srubov and his assistants Pepel and Katz reads out a long list of all kinds of real and perceived counter-revolutionaries and class enemies. Those arrested are always immediately found guilty and the sentence, regardless of the accusation, gender and age of the person, is the same – to be shot.