horrors of war in 1940s Belarus

Rating: 10/10 (7 January 2017)

Elem Klimov's final film is a devastating look at the horrors of war through the eyes of a teenage boy who joins the partisans in Belarus (then the Byelorussian SSR or White Russian SSR). Much like Mike Nichols's "Catch-22" and Steven Spielberg's "Saving Private Ryan", "Idi i smotri" ("Come and See" in English) makes you feel as if the war is hitting you directly. And this movie leaves little to the imagination in showing the Nazis' brutality. Probably the most famous scene is when the Nazis burn down a house. There's music playing the entire time to ensure that the noise doesn't stop. You have rarely seen something as intense as this on screen.
Klimov's wife Larisa Shepitko directed the equally intense movie "The Ascent", about some Soviet troops who try to defend a house from the Nazis (Shepitko got killed in a car wreck a few years later). The important thing to remember is that the Soviet Union lost almost 27 million people fighting the Nazis, more than any other country (it probably would've been more if the winter hadn't held the Nazis back). There's a reason why Russians still refer to the Great Patriotic War, as opposed to simply World War II. And this is one of the many movies that emphasize it. Definitely watch it.