[5] The director viewed the film as an extended experiment in which the juxtaposition and misalignment of sound were completely intentional.

[3] The setting of the film is an important facet of examining Vertov’s intent as a director, since Ukraine’s Donbas region was a focal point of the Five-Year Plan.

[6] In his writings, Vertov expounded on the prominent role he envisioned for the natural resources: “Coal comes out of the earth.

He attempted to do so by refusing to synchronize the film's images with its score to create a greater effect on the viewers.

Presumably due to the complex role Vertov wanted his film's score to undertake, one source[7] describes the movie's sounds as a “protagonist” in and of itself.

“In 1931, in his Entuziazm (subtitled ‘Symphony of the Donbas’) he turned the microphone into protagonist just as earlier, he had made the camera his hero.

Not only did he and his team conduct a successful experiment with a mobile microphone, they did not settle for simply synchronizing sound and image, instead taking the line of ‘greatest resistance’ by creating an eloquent counterpoint between the two.”[7] The film opens with a young woman putting on and adjusting a radio headset.

The film then moves between shots of the young woman with the radio to various individuals praying outside of a church in front of a statue of Jesus Christ.

The setting of the film changes and transitions to a montage of images representing industrialization and mechanization, along with references to the Five-Year Plan.

There is an announcement made which states that the Five-Year Plan, presumably due to workers’ enthusiasm and dedication, was completed in four years.

Approximately an hour in the film's runtime, various celebrations take place to rejoice the victory of socialism.

John MacKay, Professor of Slavic Languages and Literatures[8] and a specialist in Soviet cinema studies at Yale, has argued that Enthusiasm can be divided into three sections.

[5] Just before the film’ release the director wrote: “The shooting of Enthusiasm was completed more than half a year ago.

Not an evaluation in general terms (outside of time and space), but one based on sound cinema’s present state of development.”[5] The movie was released on 2 April 1931.

He has written that the project's goals were incredibly ambitious and most likely beyond the technological capabilities—in the realm of sound production and film footage—of his time.

In John McKay's "Disorganized Noise: Enthusiasm and the Ear of the Collective",[6] he notes that Enthusiasm—along with another Vertov film, One Sixth of the World—was accused of presenting a sort of utopian world in which socialism was established and functioned without any apparent conflict.

[6] Vertov’s decision to present a society in which socialism had triumphed and create a movie without conflict—without a struggle to mirror the challenges in the real-world realization of socialism—gained him his share of critics.