The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Story: It's very simple but honestly that is fine.

Mostly, the movie is committed to the value of a good time.

Being a Russian, which means that I was raised on epic WWII movies a lot of which I came to simply love for many reasons besides great acting and plot, I have to admit that this one became my favorite.As you must have read from other comments, this movie has nothing to do with what most people expect from war movie: no propaganda, no superheros, no battle scenes. In fact the war makes just an environmental case here. The movie is all about characters and the plot that keeps you tense to the end. IMO these factors make it a fairly international movie.

what you must consider before commenting on this movie is that it is based on a great book by Vladimir Bogomolov, which is quite long and detailed. As a result, making a movie based on that book has been a very difficult task. I recommend reading the book before watching the movie so as to understand what is going on, because the movie sort of 'dives in'. If you do not feel like reading the book, then at least spend half an hour reading about Belarus in 1944 and the Smersh, which translates from Russian as 'Death to Spies'. I you have no idea what the front was like in 1944 and have not read the book, you could be somewhat disappointed with the movie.

Pros:This movie does not force a bunch of cheesy propaganda down your throat. No banner waving so typical for American flicks, no bad Germans and good Russians so typical for Soviet war movies. In fact, there are no Germans in it! All you see a bunch of SMERSH guys doing their job, and doing it well. Technically, the movie is very accurate. Uniforms, weapons, vehicles... all top notch. Very nice locations, settings, camera work and editing.Cons:The story lacks action and any kind of suspense. Which would be almost OK if it was 40 minutes shorter. I wish the director had better script to work with.The verdict: An average Soviet (in this case, post-Soviet) war flick, decently shot and acted but pretty boring.The rating: 5/10.Go see Das Boot if you want a really striking non-Hollywood WWII movie.

I like war history and like to watch war movies. This one, in my opinion, is nothing more that a very unbelivable story about supermen from special secret police forces which seek an enemy intelligence group in Belorussian forests. The movie is full of historcal and technical mistakes, actors' works except of one are poor, the one is Chief of Food Depot which is absolutely perfect but only about one minute long. All action goes about three houses, two glades and one truck. For me the most puzzle is where the declared something about 40-million US $ budget for the movie was spent?