Dear Comrade documents the story of Llano del Rio (1914-18), the most important non-religious communitarian experiment in western American history. Llano is offered as a site to explore the struggles, courage, frustrations, fantasies, and Sisyphean efforts of innumerable idealists who have assumed comparable struggles in spite of tremendous odds. The story is told through archival footage, surreal re-enactments, interviews with ex-colonists and historians, and the meanderings of a silent, nomad through the ruins of the Llano colony in the Mojave Desert. Through the intersection of stories, a seemingly traditional documentary film morphs into a montage of parallel universes, political commentary, clownery, and a palpable desire — failings and disappointments notwithstanding — to give idealism and cooperation another try.