Watch The Defection of Simas Kudirka (1978) Free Online

Release Date: 1978

Cast: Alan Arkin

Categories: Movies, Drama Film, Docudrama, Political Drama

The Defection of Simas Kudirka is a 1978 television movie based on actual events, featuring Alan Arkin as Simas Kudirka, a Lithuanian merchant seaman in Soviet-era 1970 who attempts to defect to the United States by jumping onto a U.S. Coast Guard cutter. Among the movie's awards are two Emmys and another three Emmy nominations. The movie was directed by David Lowell Rich. The movie revolves around real-life Lithuanian seaman Simas Kudirka, a radio operator on a Soviet fish processing vessel. When his ship meets at sea with a U.S. Coast Guard cutter near Martha's Vineyard in early 1970,... MORE

The Defection of Simas Kudirka is a 1978 television movie based on actual events, featuring Alan Arkin as Simas Kudirka, a Lithuanian merchant seaman in Soviet-era 1970 who attempts to defect to the United States by jumping onto a U.S. Coast Guard cutter. Among the movie's awards are two Emmys and another three Emmy nominations. The movie was directed by David Lowell Rich. The movie revolves around real-life Lithuanian seaman Simas Kudirka, a radio operator on a Soviet fish processing vessel. When his ship meets at sea with a U.S. Coast Guard cutter near Martha's Vineyard in early 1970, Kudirka makes a dramatic leap from the deck, landing on the USCGC Vigilant. He announces that he wishes to defect, but confusion over U.S. policy on defections prevent the Americans from offering him asylum. As the crew of the Vigilant looks on helplessly, Soviet officers are allowed to board the cutter, beat and bind Kudirka, and drag him back to his own ship. This tinderbox political incident occurs during a Soviet/U.S. conference over fishing rights. The ultimate fate of Simas Kudirka provides the core of the script. The movie was filmed in Portsmouth, NH, the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in LESS