Enemy at the Gates

December 10, 2004

Rated: R Runtime: 131 min Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

“…await the right moment for one, and only one well-aimed shot” -Vassili Zaitsev

Enemy at the Gates

Many directors would love to have the opportunity to make a film about a war story that has been argued over for years as to whether it was historical fact or propaganda. With “Enemy at the Gates,” director Jean-Jacques Annaud got this rare chance and, thanks to an overabundance of political correctness and the like, has managed to single-handedly take what might have otherwise been a 5-star movie and fudge it up to the point that it barely rates 3-stars.

The story of the famous duel between Vassili Zaitsev, a real-life Russian shepherd-turned-sniper, and the possibly fictitious head of the Nazi sniper school (named Koenig or Thorwald depending on who is telling the story) during the horrific WWII battle of Stalingrad may or may not be true. Regardless of the tale’s dubious nature, however, it is still a darn good story with lots of big-screen potential. As I alluded to above, however, our society’s modern “PC” attitudes have nearly ruined the whole thing.

To illustrate the point, all you need to do is look back at one of the best movies in recent years, Clint Eastwood’s masterpiece “Unforgiven”. Like in this movie, the whole thing boiled down to two people being pushed by fate to a final, decisive conflict. Neither of the characters can be classified as a “good guy” or a “bad guy” and that simple fact, to me, is the key to that movie’s greatness.

Unfortunately for us, Annaud decided to turn the entire struggle into a conflict between two ideals instead of two men. To make things worse, it would seem that he felt it necessary to make Zaitsev a reluctant, semi-pacifistic soldier who, if not for the despicable actions of Koenig, would have been happy to avoid any contact between himself and the German sniper.

All this ranting aside, however, there is still a lot to like about this movie. The visuals, for instance, are utterly spectacular. After seeing the Stalingrad depicted here, I’m firmly convinced that I now know what it must be like in hell and the opening battle sequence rivals even the vaunted D-Day landing from “Saving Private Ryan.” This often forgotten part of WWII was a gritty, nasty, desperate conflict and all of it seems to have been captured by Annaud.

The acting performances were also quite good. Even though I didn’t like that they made Harris’ character an evil bastard, he plays it quite well! Jude Law also did a great job with his portrayal of Zaitsev. Bob Hoskins makes an amusing Krushchev as well.

Overall, this is a movie worth seeing. If you know the history and/or you hate political correctness, you won’t like it nearly as much as others will, but there’s still a lot of praiseworthy stuff here.

Posted by Alex | Filed Under 3 Stars, Drama, Ed Harris, Joseph Fiennes, Jude Law, R, Rachel Weisz, Theatrical