Very effective thriller with only a few dead spots

Rating: Null/10 (30 November 2003)

When Vassili Zaitsev first arrives at the Russian front in Stalingrad, he finds himself stuck in one man's land and, before returning to his own lines, takes out five officers with one rifle. Looking for a morale booster, Political Officer Danilov uses Vassili as a hero to spur the other men on. However when the Germans' morale falls due to the snipers, they bring in Major Konig, an expert sniper, to hunt down and kill the Russian hero. Thus begins a game of cat and mouse between the two men.
For some strange reason I had got the impression that this film was slow, overlong and dull. I can't remember where I got that impression from (maybe unfair critics?) but it stopped me going to the cinema to see it. As it was, I really enjoyed the film and was very pleasantly surprised by just how good it was. I expected something full of pretension and long, slow pauses but instead it was am effective little thriller which was tight in the right places and only a little baggy and slow at times.
The film manages to give a good impression of the war in Stalingrad and, while not totally up to `Private Ryan' shock power, the opening 15 minutes are very realistic and very powerful. After this point the cat and mouse game is simply done but pretty exciting. The only aspect that I felt slowed things down a tad was the romantic subplot involving Tania. This didn't help the pace of the film but, with the way the film goes, was a necessary part of the plot overall.
The cast are good all round, with even small roles taken by well known actors. Law is very good in the lead and he holds the attention well whether lying totally still or having a crisis of confidence. Fiennes is not quite as good but is still OK, his character is less clear and is very much secondary to Law's. Weisz is OK but it is hard to accept her clean skin and beauty in a character such as hers, she doesn't do a bad job, but I think it could have been better with someone else. Although Harris doesn't say very much he has a great screen presence and his character is strong for that as opposed to development. The support cast includes Bob Hoskins and Perlman.
Overall this is not a perfect film but it is very atmospheric, with a great sense of time and place and the main game of cat and mouse is very enjoyable and quite tense. Much better than I expected it to be.