Come and See (1985)

 

This film's reputation preceded it I had seen it mentioned on Twitter again and again. Someone was kind enough to distribute the YT link. So I sad down and watched it

I may have seen bits of Come and See years ago on Channel 4. 

It is a beautiful but horrible movie. 

The forests of Belarus look beautiful. The Stork, The beautiful twin baba's with deep blue eyes. Everyone in this film has piercing eyes. The bedclothes of the babushka.  The mud and bog and the straw, of rural life. . 

The budget constraints aside- The tracer shot is done with crude special effects. The grass in places has obviously been cut recently. The model of a German reconnaissance plane is obviously a model 

Like Django unchained it occasionally detracts from the seriousness and horror of it's story with stylistic flourishes which I found ill judged. it is better when you see things unstated- the pile of bodies. 

So this is the Eastern front in all it's petty and gross horror. The vehicles driven like maniacs by peasants and drunks. A corpse pressganged into service as a decoy. Peasants being robbed. Flor trying to pull a half ton cow back to camp. The absurd legalism of the Germans - the SS soldier has to give the nod before the female lead can be gang raped into insensibility- The cowardice -the German officer who tries to sell his men out The Hiwi who rejoices at catching a Jew. A Rosov following along the Germans in Uniform. 

Flor is deafened by an attack on his camp. The film plays with it volume and audio to recreate the feeling of being death. This adds to the unpleasantness

A terrible film. Not a bad one, or a poor one. Simply terrible