[lbo-talk] Russian/Soviet cinema

B. docile_body at yahoo.com
Sun Aug 19 14:06:30 PDT 2007


Maybe I am a latecomer to the works of Elem Klimov, but I recently watched "Come & see" (the 2xDVD Kino version) -- and HOLY SHIT. I was blown away. Instantly one of my top 5 favorite movies, ever. For those not in the know, _Come & See_ is a Russian film set in Nazi-occupied Russia, about a boy who joins a gang of Russian partisans and all the attending horrors he witnesses as he's ultimately captured by them, etc.

Hard to believe it was made a couple of years before Platoon, yet when Platoon came out critics, etc., were going on about that being the ultimate war movie. Come & See is so incredibly disturbing that I find myself amazed, in retrospect, that it hasn''t garnered more accolades than it has, or is even considered int he same universe of films as Platoon or Full Metal Jacket. I think Klimov's film even blows stuff like Schindler's List, Apocalypse Now, etc., out of the water. It "transcends the genre," as they say -- it isn't "merely" a war movie, like Peckinpah's _Cross of Iron_, or something. It's a deeply disturbing, psychologically compelling film.

-B.

Chris Doss wrote:

"For those interested in such things, a sequel is being made to the classic Gorbachev-era movie Malenkaya Vera (Little Vera). (Gorby-era movies tend to be dark, likethat one and a series of crime dramas I can think of.) Anyway it's the same director and the same actress playing Vera, 20 years on. IIRC that was the first Russian film to depict sex. OK I know Moscow Doesn't Believe in Tears did it first, but that part was edited out in the Soviet version."



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