Depressing, Unstructured, Incohesive, Poorly directed, Overrated Rabble.
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keremk — 9 years ago(October 01, 2016 03:57 AM)
Just watched it and couldn't agree with the OP more. The viewing experience of this movie feels like browsing through various youtube clips. Every scene is extremely detached from every other part of the movie. At least there are clips in youtube that are nice to watch.
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Chronic_Johnson — 6 years ago(January 06, 2020 04:38 PM)
This film may lack a particularly interesting narrative, and its structure is quite unconventional, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. I also don't expect 1980s Soviet countries to have fantastic Hollywood level filming equipment and budgeting. Even so, because of the unconventional plot structure, it does have a somewhat surreal atmosphere and flow which assists in instead reeling you in with the horrors of war. Which it very much so succeeds in with incredible acting, especially in a character's reactions to the events they witness or experience.
There are long, lingering shots of characters going through something unpleasant (which is an understatement), and then in the brief moments where we get rest from this, I begin to notice that we get less of those lingering shots and more conventional jump cuts. The camera staying on a particular scene without cutting can sometimes go on so long in this film that it becomes unsettling. You can feel at an unease simply from the cinematography, and that is an achievement to be respected. You're there with them, with no escape, in the middle of a war, and experiencing it all.
A moment that comes to mind isn't necessarily an incredibly shocking one. But when the main protagonist and a girl are slowly walking through the deep mud immediately after
leaving behind the home where the protagonist's entire family were killed by the Nazis.
The sound editing in that scene where you just hear their muffled cries and screams(?) and the camera following them in one long panning shot until they get to the other side is quite intense.
That's not even mentioning the several scenes where we get close up shots of the main protagonist's tortured and traumatized face just staring directly into the camera. It can be quite haunting at times. I'm not surprised that it's been used on some of the posters for the film. And it's moments like that that truly make it a war film. Because it is very convincing of how awful the experience might have been, even if they do take some creative liberties with what happened.
I can understand someone not liking the film, overall I think it's just fine, but not much better than that. It has impressive acting and an unrelentingly bleak tone that fits the war setting. But outside of that it's not a great film. 6/10 for me.
Recommended if: you want to watch a constantly depressing war movie with imagery that will stick with you for long after you finished watching it. But can also tolerate its various flaws and unconventional plot structuring.