Why so much hype?

Captivating movie !

Boring, over-political, tech fuzed mess

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

I have not yet seen the film, but as a World War 2 historian just the previews hit pretty hard ... the scene dramatizing the historical photos of people pulling sleighs with little bodies on them, for example ... and I shall try to find a copy around Oslo to watch, to complete this.The reviewer who expressed doubt the Russians would mount an unsupported infantry attack across open ground is wrong. In the first years of the war, many Russian lives were wasted in such desperate attacks, often forced at gunpoint by NKVD political commissars.Defense Minister Voroshilov - one of only two of five prewar Red Army marshals to survive the NKVD purges of the Red Army ordered by Stalin - had been sent to Leningrad to personally defend it, and he personally led one of these desperate counterattacks.I will be interested to see if there are any sequences of K(limenti)V(oroshilov) tanks rolling out of the Kirov tank works and directly into battle? On my CoatneyHistory webpage, I have a free little boardgame titled Leningrad 1941: the Embattled City, about the early Wehrmacht onslaught (until the Germans shifted panzer and infantry forces to the attack on Moscow), with a dedication to its people.The theme of my webpages is "The more we learn about the Second World War, the better our chances it will be the LAST world war." We NEVER want another one, and this film looks like it inescapably shows how the innocent - especially children - suffer most.By the way, the pretty Russian actress who played Natalia in Sergey Bondarshuk's epic 1966 War and Peace film, Lyudmila Saveleva, was born in Leningrad on 24 January 1942, during the worst of the siege and starvation.Lou Coatney

What a disappointment .... This SHOULD have been a great film, with such a topic, it should have been a great epic. Instead , we get a rather formulaic and simple minded romance story, so devoid of feeling for the historical complexity of this vast tragedy, that it comes across as an insult to the memory of all those millions who suffered and died here. The story of a stranded British war correspondent (Sorvino) and her lover (Byrne), which apparently is based on true events, would have worked as a subtext; a sideline to the larger human events transpiring, but, Hollywood-style, it takes front and centre, while the Russian People are largely relegated to roles as stereotyped KGB bad guys or masses of faceless ragamuffins dragging coffin-laden sledges along windy alleyways. None of the great players are fleshed out in this mess ... Zhdanov, whose heroic efforts saved so many, is shown only in passing, while Stalin, whose bad decisions led to the siege of Leningrad, is not even mentioned.Sorvino, who, even when looking withered and starved, still has the cutest smiles in film history, tries desperately to bring some life to this, but is defeated by her desperate attempt to affect a British accent, amid the generally poor direction. The other big-name actors don't even try, as they are handed only bit parts.After this, and "The Barber of Siberia", I'm coming to the conclusion that any Russian film with western actors should be avoided like the plague. A Pity. If you want to see a great Russian film about WW2, see Tarkovski's early film, "The Childhood of Ivan", or Elem Klimov's "Come and See". If you want to know something about the siege of Leningrad read Harrison Salisbury's harrowing epic, "The 900 Days". The movie's not a total bomb, It may be worth watching if you're a Russian film buff like myself, or might be enjoyable, if you know nothing about the siege of Leningrad ... It's just an immense disappointment, compared to what it should have been.

True to the title, the film is about Leningrad during World War 2. Not so true, of the actors promoted, only Mira Sorvino has a significant role in the film which is dominated and carried by her and Olga Sutulova, who hopefully has earned herself more roles.The film provides some much needed perspective on WW2. At least in America, and it seems the entire film world, Russia's struggles against Nazi Germany have been essentially ignored. There's very little perspective upon it, no doubt in part due to the extended Cold War.In addition to historical perspective, it also provides modern war perspective. Leningrad can in many ways be seen as Iraq and Afghanistan, both of which the war on seem more to eliminate the people who live there and take over the region than to liberate it. Intended or not, that is the essence of the story of this film.

A very bad film, an amalgam of clichés and historical inaccuracies. A few examples: in an early scene Soviet infantry are attacked by the Germans; instead of staying in their trenches to shoot at them, they advance into open ground to fight them,contrary to all infantry tactics; Kate, one of the central characters, is supposedly the daughter of a White Russian and obsessed with her Russianness, yet she does not speak Russian; a guilt-stricken German airman attacks an anti-aircraft gun- the gun, however, does not fire shrapnel shells but scores a direct hit on his 'plane, which doesn't look much like a German 'plane of WWII. In fairness, when they could escape the preposterous plot and the consequent absurdities there are some genuinely powerful moments- the depiction of people slowly starving to death is convincingly done and moving, but these only show up the rest of it even more. A film to be avoided.