Dark, depressing portrait of the defeat of the german army at Stalingrad.Good at depicting the utter destructiveness of war. Bad at portraying the German war crimes.

Rating: 8/10 (13 November 2018)

Beware: The german movie "Stalingrad" (1993) must not be confused with identical titles, yet different movies from 2013, 2003 and 1990. Dialogues, photography and acting in the german "Stalingrad" from 1993, are good, although not superb. "Stalingrad" is a very impressive portrait of the utter destructiveness of war though. One of the better war movies I have seen in the past decades!
"Stalingrad" is (thankfully) NOT a crowdpleasing action movie. It as bleak and depressing as it gets. As it should be, because any war movie that glorifies violence is like watching a fairytale. "Stalingrad" is true to life though, in the depicting of the demoralizing horrific consequences of war, but it is bad at showing the German war crimes in its full colors, because this story is told from a german standpoint of view. And that shows.
Looking at this movie from a historical point of view it is noteworthy that the german soldiers in this war movie are being portrayed rather positive by the german filmddirector.Not at all a balanced view, because the german soldiers were THE NR 1 cause of 2 million people who were slaughtered at Stalingrad. And if they werent being directly slaughtered by the germans, they would have died of starvation, caused by that same german army.
But this unbalanced positive portrait of german soldiers doesnt make it a bad war movie though, on the contrary. I must admit that this is one of the better war movies I have ever seen during the past decades. Why? Because there are only a few war movies that DONT glorify war violence. And after seeing "Stalingrad" one definitely does NOT wanna glorify war ever again. Stanley Kubricks "Full Metal Jacket" is another example of a classic "anti-war" movie. I felt sick of any sort of violence after watching "Stalingrad". For that specific reason I recommend this war movie very much...