Paradise lost

Rating: 7/10 (11 May 2015)

The Soviet Union (1930s to 1953)
The movie opens with a starving, desperate boy escaping from a Ukrainian orphanage in the early 1930s during the great famine which ultimately killed millions in Ukraine. The killings are now known as the Holodomor and were Joseph Stalin's doing as he used draconian measures to force the Ukrainian kulaks to give up their independent farms and adopt collectivization on state-controlled collective farms. Stalin was also responsible for the systematic deportations and murders of prominent Ukrainians. Approximately ten million perished in this great purge. In the US during the Second World War people fondly referred to Stalin as Uncle Joe, but Stalin was no kindly uncle. He was directly responsible for the deaths of millions of human beings as was Adolph Hitler. Both were monsters. And although the two political systems of Nazism and Communism were at the opposite ends of the political spectrum, both used the same methods: leader adulation, brutal force, rampant devastation, and mass murder. And both totally despised each other to the last core of their being.
The boy is rescued by Soviet troops and adopted by a Russian officer, who renames him Leo. He becomes Leo Demidov (Tom Hardy). And the next scene we see him and his wartime buddy, Alexei Andreyev (Fares Fares), storming the German Reichstag in Berlin and hoisting the bright red Soviet flag flapping in the wind on the roof of the Reichstag, showing to what was left of the battered German forces that the Soviets had taken their capital, Berlin.* This was on 2 May 1945 and the photo taken of this event became as symbolic in the Soviet Union as the photo of the four US Marines hoisting the flag on Iwo Jima. The war in Europe ended May 8 with the unconditional surrender of Germany to the Allied Forces of the United States, Great Britain, France, and the Soviet Union.
There are no murders in paradise. Paradise being the Soviet Union, which was considered a paradise for the workers. So, there could be no murders committed there by loyal Soviet citizens. Any murder was considered the work of capitalist spies who were out to destroy the Soviet Union. We now see Leo Demidov in 1953 where he is a high-level MGB investigator who has been smitten with Raisa (Noomi Rapace) and soon they are married, although we learn later her motive for marriage was far different from what Leo could ever have imagined.
We see Leo at work tracking down people believed to be spies against the Soviet Union. We see torture and killings. We see mass arrests and harassment of ordinary Soviet citizens by MGB police. The "spy" taken captive by Leo's staff under torture reveals names of seven others, and among them is Raisa. In the midst of all this Alexei's son is brutally murdered, but the MGB authorities label his death as an accident because officially there are no murders. Soon Leo and Raisa are transported to Volsk, Siberia as a demotion and Leo must report to the general of the militia there, General Mikhail Nesterov (Gary Oldman). Another child is murdered in Volsk, and Leo convinces General Nesterov that someone is purposefully and systematically murdering children. Eventually Leo and Raisa track down the murderer with the help of Nesterov. The murderer makes a stunning confession to Leo before being shot by Leo's adversary and Bete Noire, Vasili (Joel Kennaman). Leo triumphs over Vasili and Raisa realizes she's married a good man.
The movie has many good points. The acting is very good and the scenery and costumes struck me as being very convincing in their depiction of the Soviet Union in 1953 and the kind of living that must have prevailed there in those times. The chief problem with the movie is that it tackles as many flaws of the Soviet system as it can, and the theme of the title, Child 44, seemed to get lost in the many comings and goings. Of what I've read, the book does the same thing. Since I've never read it, I can't comment on how successful, or unsuccessful, the book was following this approach. But following this approach in the movie means the movie's focus keeps shifting and the one-thing-right-after-another introduces too many subthemes for the audience to readily relate to. Too many things to chew on, so to speak. Some serious editing was required and it didn't happen.
I can only give this movie a 7 out of 10. Good try though. And I'd still recommend it as a good historical drama set in one of the US's most tenacious adversaries at the height of its power and influence.
* It's not exactly clear who the actual Soviet soldier was who hoisted the flag on the roof of the Reichstag. Suggesting his name was Leo Demidov is artistic license on the part of the movie.