Winstanley

Based on a true story during the English Civil War (1642-1651), this film explores the boundaries of religious, economic, and political freedoms previously liberated during the Protestant Reformation. Social reformer and writer Gerard Winstanley (1609-1676) leads a religious sect of farmers using communal land to feed those displaced by the war. Along with a small band of followers known as the Diggers, Winstanley tried to establish a self-sufficient farming community on common land at St George's Hill near Surrey. The community was one of the world's first small-scale experiments in socialism or communism, leaving a legacy of ideas to inspire later generations of socialist theorists.