Apocalyptic vision of Nazi horrors is shocking but perhaps not shocking enough

Rating: 6/10 (2 October 2010)

After spending a good deal of time wading through many of the reviews of 'Come and See', I've found that there's pretty much a consensus that the 1985 Soviet film about a Nazi massacre in a Byelorussian (Belarus) village is a cinematic masterpiece. There was one review however, that caught my eye where the film critic expressed some reservations and that was Walter Goodman of (believe it or not) The New York Times! He called the film's director, Elem Klimov, a "master of a sort of unreal realism". And I agree that this term, "unreal realism", captures the essence of the director's approach.
Daniel Goldhagen in his brilliant book, "Hitler's Willing Executioneers – Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust", makes the point that Hitler could not have been successful without the overwhelming backing of the ordinary German. The great value of Goldhagen's tome is that he puts a human face on the killers. He describes in detail how police battalions, consisting of ordinary Germans who were given little training and weren't always Nazi party members, were conscripted and fought in tandem with the specialized killing regiments (such as the Eiznsatzgruppen), other SS and SD units as well as the regular Army, during various "aktions' against the civilian populations (principally Jewish) in Eastern Europe. What I found out from reading Goldhagen's book is that the killers did not have to fear any reprisals if they decided to opt out from participating in the massacres. Quite the contrary, the commanders were only looking for volunteers and for the few who actually were part of a very small minority that found that murdering people made them too queasy, they could be given a much more benign assignment. When they weren't committing heinous crimes, these Germans were involved in ordinary pursuits such as participating in track and field events or going bowling. One officer even brought his wife to witness one of the massacres.
Klimov's approach, however, is to view events at a distance. None of the Byelorussian townspeople or partisans are developed into characters of any depth. Similarly, there is little attempt to humanize the Germans (until the end when Klimov does show the SD commander begging for his life and another officer refusing to back down, spouting his racist views). For me, this could have been a more powerful (and of course a very different film) if Klimov gave his characters some personality and perhaps had focused on one particular German antagonist. Instead, ALL the Germans are lumped into a collective mass. By humanizing the killers, the cruelty of the Germans would have proved more up close and personal.
Instead Klimov's distancing effect softens the horror. It's as though one is viewing a Hieronymus Bosch painting in a museum and is fascinated by the images of hell the artist has created. We never actually SEE the people who murder Florya's family; the horror is muted as Glasha only catches a fleeting glance of the dead bodies piled against Floyra's house. It's shocking but perhaps not shocking enough! Similarly, we feel nothing for the villagers who presumably fled and whose terrifying escape is never shown (and we never learn how they actually escape to the island across the bog).
The great value of Come and See is that Klimov DOES show how the Germans, as a collective mass, actually enjoy what they're doing. The massacre appears as it's a drunken orgy, a macabre carnival, where murder becomes one big joke. That of course is one aspect of the horror and it's quite effectively conveyed in the final scene of the movie. In contrast, since we are not invested in any of the villagers who are herded into the locked building and then machine-gunned and set on fire nor are we acquainted with any of the killers on a personal level, the full import of the horror again feels muted. Yes, there is a shot of the villagers trapped inside, pounding on the door but it's seen from a distance. It's left up to the viewers imagination as to what's happening inside the burning building. Similarly, we see the lone woman who jumps out of the building before the conflagration and is dragged to a truck where she PRESUMABLY is raped as the truck drives off (and more soldiers pile in). Again, it's left to our imagination as to what happens to the poor woman but Klimov spares us the complete import of the horror. To repeat: it's shocking but perhaps not shocking enough.
While Klimov focuses on the massacre of the Byelorussians, it should be noted that the first group of people the Germans always singled out for extermination during all their murderous forays, were the Jews. The Jews were considered "non-human", as opposed to the various Eastern Europeans who were dubbed "sub-human". So I was puzzled that Klimov only shows the capture of one lone Jew (yes, it's possible the Jews in the village had already been "disposed" of before the massacre takes place) but I wonder if that lone Jew would have been given 'special treatment' by the Germans (such as being hung in the Village square for anyone left alive to see), instead of being thrown into the building with the rest of the villagers.
Unlike Sean Penn who gushes (as part of the DVD special features) that Come and See is a powerful "anti-war" movie, I see its strength as more a cautionary tale about Fascism than the more generic polemic against war. I found Florya's loss of innocence perhaps the most 'obvious' part of the film as one would expect that war would have a most deleterious effect upon any child.
In the end, one senses that the events were even worse than what is shown here. I agree with the Time's critic's appellation that 'Come and See' is a work of "unreal realism"; at best a 'noble attempt' but certainly no masterpiece as most have insisted.