Nice watch, but not much more

Rating: 6/10 (29 November 2014)

This film is supposed to display the horror of the bloodiest war in history, through the experiences of a tank crew who are on their final march inside Germany.
The director tries to immerse the audience to the psychological aspect of land warfare, by including numerous violent,raw scenes and by contrasting the cynical, almost inhumane attitude of the battle hardened veteran tankies, to that of a naive, young replacement whose moral values pose a threat to the safety of the entire crew. Although the film does move the audience, it goes a long way and loses its balance. If you 're interested in something truly realistic about WW2 (close to the band-of-brothers series), this movie is probably going to leave you with a bitter taste in your mouth.
The focus is almost exclusively on the dark side of the tank crews, who are presented as if they were already soul-burned by their year-long campaign in western Europe. It almost completely disregards the fact that these events were taking place about a month before the end of the war, when most of these guys had a high morale and just wanted to come home.
There are some cool scenes, like the one with the Shermans vs Tiger, but most fail to convey the tactics and ferocity of the battles that took place. The closing one, which is also the lengthiest, is a big disappointment and reminds me of old-Hollywood-movie-style scenes which depict completely ridiculous actions of bravery and self sacrifice in the face of an all-evil, blatantly incompetent, but vastly superior in numbers enemy. Did the plot writer forget that these events where taking place in 1945, when the Nazis were seriously and hopelessly outnumbered? Sure, there had been instances of 5 guys against 200, but no sane allied crew would ever choose to sacrifice themselves when they had nothing important to defend, an easy alternative to survive and especially when they knew that the war was almost over. Furthermore, the Nazis in this scene are presented as mindless puppets for target practice.
Overall it's a movie worth watching, but don't expect too much from it.