The Revolutionary (1971) Timeline Explained – Every Event in Order

A is expelled from the university after the dean suspends him for his increasingly radical political activities. His girlfriend Anne also ends their relationship during this period. This dual loss, academic status and personal connection, marks the beginning of his complete immersion in radical politics, as he believes the campus leftist organization is not militant enough and seeks more extreme action.

Foreshadowing: Earlier scenes show A criticizing the campus group for being too moderate, hinting at his eventual departure.

• university suspension
• political expulsion
• Anne breaks up
• radicalization

Despard refuses to mobilize his Marxist group under direct orders from the Party. This decision leaves A adrift at a critical moment when the radical movement appears to need action most desperately. The Party's directive creates a rift in the movement and abandons A, who is left without organizational support as circumstances intensify.

Foreshadowing: The tension between the campus organization's caution and Despard's more militant approach foreshadows the factional divisions that ultimately paralyze the group.

• Despard
• Party orders
• factional infighting
• mobilization refusal

A deserts when his army unit receives orders to suppress another workers' strike. Having already gone underground and lost his university status, A cannot bring himself to violenty crush fellow workers who are striking for the same cause he once championed. His desertion represents a final break from mainstream society and pushes him deeper into the underground.

Foreshadowing: A's earlier criticism of the campus organization for not being militant enough, combined with his sympathy for workers, sets up his inability to turn against striking workers.

• army desertion
• workers strike
• military draft
• going underground

The general strike that Despard organizes fails catastrophically. Government forces crack down heavily on the radicals, resulting in widespread arrests and the collapse of the organized resistance. This failure forces A to go underground to avoid arrest, fundamentally altering his trajectory from an activist to a fugitive living in constant concealment.

Foreshadowing: The group's planning and optimism in earlier scenes make the eventual failure and crackdown more devastating.

• general strike failure
• government crackdown
• Despard
• underground

A serves as a contingency in the assassination plot. While Leonard II plants the primary bomb intended to kill the judge, A carries a secondary bomb as an emergency device. His task is to detonate the second bomb if Leonard II's primary device fails, ensuring the judge is eliminated regardless of technical difficulties.

Foreshadowing: The conspiracy involves multiple layers of planning, with A inserted as a backup, foreshadowing the eventual malfunction.

• bomb plot
• judge assassination
• Leonard II
• secondary bomb

When Leonard II's bomb fails to detonate as planned, A is left holding the secondary bomb and faces the judge directly. This climactic moment leaves A at a critical crossroads, potentially forced to either detonate the device or be caught with it. The malfunction creates a tense standoff that represents the ultimate failure of the revolutionary plot.

Foreshadowing: The earlier detail that A carries an emergency backup device foreshadows this exact scenario unfolding.

• bomb malfunction
• courtroom climax
• judge
• Leonard II plot failure

A believes the campus leftist organization is not militant enough for his increasingly radical views. He actively seeks more aggressive action and finds Despard's working-class factory-based group more aligned with his revolutionary ideology. Despard's group is planning more militant actions than the cautious campus organization, which appeals to A's escalating commitment to violent resistance.

Foreshadowing: A's early criticism of the campus group's moderation directly leads him to seek out more extreme company.

• Despard group
• campus radicals
• militant organization
• factory workers

Leonard II is a radical that A encounters at a bar, where Despard is also present. He draws A into his circle and develops the more violent schemes that include liberating a pawn shop and assassinating the judge overseeing the trial of convicted factory workers. Leonard II represents an even more extreme faction within the radical movement that A becomes entangled with after Despard's group fractures.

Foreshadowing: The meeting at the bar marks a turning point where A shifts allegiances from Despard to Leonard II's more violent plans.

• Leonard II
• bar meeting
• pawn shop raid
• violent plot

Helen is a bourgeois woman who provides A with sanctuary in a greenhouse, hiding him from political authorities. After A deserts from the army and seeks refuge with her, the narrative moves forward and he eventually leaves this fragile sanctuary. The summary does not detail her specific fate, but her role represents the brief moment of safety and personal connection A experiences before returning to the dangerous political conspiracy.

Foreshadowing: Helen's brief refuge offers a moment of peace before the final, more dangerous conspiracy arc begins.

• Helen
• greenhouse sanctuary
• bourgeois woman
• hiding

The ending leaves A in a profoundly isolated and bleak position. He is utterly alone, abandoned by his comrades, Despard's group has fractured, and Leonard II's plot has failed. Standing before the judge with a malfunctioning bomb, A faces the collapse of his revolutionary path. The film concludes with him at a critical crossroads, symbolizing the complete failure of his ideological journey and leaving his ultimate fate ambiguous but ominously grim.

Foreshadowing: The narrative's steady progression from university to underground to conspiracy builds toward this moment of total isolation and failure.

• ending
• isolation
• revolutionary failure
• abandoned by comrades
• bleak conclusion

The conspiracy targets the judge because he is scheduled to oversee the trial of convicted factory workers from the failed strike. The radicals view his elimination as a way to disrupt the legal process and strike a blow against state power that is prosecuting their fellow workers. This assassination plot represents the escalation from general strikes and protests to direct political violence.

Foreshadowing: The failed strike and subsequent arrests of workers establish the judge's role as an agent of state repression.

• judge trial
• factory workers
• assassination plot
• state violence