Clevercell Very disappointing...

Neive Bellamy Excellent and certainly provocative... If nothing else, the film is a real conversation starter.

Erica Derrick By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

Rexanne It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny

Theo Robertson After seeing the Russian film 9 ROTA set during the Soviet -Afghan conflict I was struck how similar it was to American war films which disappointed me since I was expecting something with a much more idiosyncratic style . I had better hopes for ZVEZDA since it is set during the second world war . The Soviet Union lost a grand total of 30 million citizens during the conflict . Putting it in to perspective both Britain and the USA lost around 350,000 war dead each . No Soiet family was left untouched and many Soviets died in the most cruel way possible . There's a famous Soviet film COME AND SEE which gives a small taste of the brutality of the Eastern front so I looked forward to this film with anticipation . Sadly like 9 ROTA I was disappointed with it for exactly the same reason - it seems more like a Hollywood movie than a Russian one The plot is simple . A team of reconnaissance scouts is sent behind Nazi lines to pick up information . It's obvious what director Nicolai Lebedev and the screenwriters are going to do with the story - they're going to make a suspenseful war drama where every five minutes the unit are in mortal danger of being caught . Two previous units on the same mission have disappeared and the unit come across the tortured bodies of one of their predecessors . This lets even the most uneducated audience members know that 1 ) The mission is dangerous 2 ) If they're caught they won't face a simple death of a bullet - they'll be skinned alive Unfortunately the more danger the unit face the more unlikely things become . For example two of the scouts climb aboard a German truck . All of a sudden Germans appear and drive the trucks off towards the German base . Two Germans sit in the back of the truck and suddenly become suspicious so pull out their pistols as they prepare to search he back . Then out of nowhere a Soviet air raid takes place allowing our scout heroes to make good their escape . Every time it looks like the unit are going to be caught something always happens that allows the unit to escape regardless of how unlikely it is . This scene also interferes with the time frame since the truck must have traveled several miles but the surviving scout manages to walk back to his unit in what seems a few minutes As far as I can remember the year isn't mentioned on screen but since the Red Army are on the frontier of the Western Soviet Union then it can only be happening in 1944 . This leads to a serious inaccuracy in the dialogue where the unit find out the Nazis are going to launch a counter-offensive with " 40,000 men and 2,000 tanks " What the Nazis had 2,000 tanks to spare in the Summer of 1944 ? I knew the biggest tank battle in history took place between the Wermacht and Red Army the previous year at Kursk where the Nazis had a grand total of 2,700 tanks . Certainly there's no way they could muster that amount of tanks in the Summer of 1944 so I take it the subtitles are wrong and should have read 200 . Even so this wouldn't have been enough to launch a counter-offensive against the Soviets who had an army of 1,500,000 ready to launch Operation Bagaration Things like this spoil the movie but it's not really a film that concerns itself with portraying history accurately otherwise we wouldn't be seeing scenes with a Soviet scout feeling sorry for the unit executing Nazi prisoners or references to " The liberation of Poland " . Its sole function is to keep the audience on tenterhooks as to the individual fate of the unit members . In this it succeeds to a large degree but one had hoped to have seen a much more " Soviet " type of film rather than a Russian film trying to emulate Hollywood

athena24 This movie is about soldiers who didn't try to be heroes. In contrast to Private Ryan they didn't question their orders. They believed in their mission, and they had to complete it whatever the cost is. Heroes it's what we call them after watching this movie.Visually, Zvezda is very decently made, though far from high budget movies like Saving Private Ryan or Enemy At The Gates. But on the other hand it wasn't the movie's goal. The director didn't try to lure us with stunning explosions, or great angle shots of a battle. He just tried to touch our feelings, which he did outstandingly.There are some minor drawbacks in the plot(like of Vorobej remembering the way back) but except of these the movie is very tense, and the last minutes bring really heart-breaking, tear-dropping moments, that can't leave anyone indifferent. I wanted to scream but I couldn't let the words out, tears ready to go.This movie is in memory of those, to whom we owe our lives, leaving our flowers over the grave-stone of the unknown soldier.

alex_kleimenov This movie is about romance that went without a touch, every word of which was sent through the airwaves in form of a code.A newly recruited radio operator girl falls for a young handsome reconnaissance officer. Zvezda is the call-sign of his squad that steals into the night on a mission that may turn deadly.Watching a movie set in the middle of a war, we instinctively try to guess who will survive until the end. In this movie, we hope they all will as we bond with the 6 guys on the squad to the point of our hearts starting to beat with theirs in unison.Communications on a reconnaissance mission is about signs and looks. That's the way a viewer gets to communicate with the characters. The contact takes place on the eye level: the eyes on the screen are larger than life, as well as what we see in them. And what we see there is very often the fear-a feeling very familiar to us, something that makes us bond with the characters even stronger. `Which one would I've been like?' is a question drilling through our heads. The plot is far from schematic and the axiom that `the ours will always win' is subject to a reasonable doubt. Tears are inevitable.A masterpiece music score accompanies the movie shot in beautiful landscapes. The cast is perfect: the actors are not well-known and free from unnecessary stigma. Don't miss a chance to see it.

elian I hope this movie will be properly distributed. I would like to see it AGAIN in a proper cinema and subtitled (not dubbed ! that would be a shame).The actors are all extremely natural and have realistic and interesting personalities.The lady is not bad either !