1944: Forced to Fight

The Estonian-Finnish cinematography friends once again joined their forces to tell the strong story of the Estonian people on whose territory the Germans and the Russians formed a corridor across Eastern Europe. And personally, I must say that it was some pretty interesting storytelling. You see, I’d had no idea about what was happening in Estonia during World War Two and this movie gave me a clear explanation. It is divided into two parts. One of them is German and the other one is Russian. They are both disgusting and they turn people into killing machines. And Estonia wasn’t even what the war was about, either. Technically, the film was well-made, it only took me a while to get used to the action sequences, which have been shot in a rather aesthetic, but also quite strange manner. On the other hand, this is not the first war movie from Finland/Estonia, so once again we can expect not only the military equipment but also the plot to be of a high quality. Especially the story, which is trying to be as close to reality as possible. Once again at the expense of leaving less space for emotions, but that’s something that I got used to when it comes to their war movies. (09/20/2016)

Very bad stuff. From the opening minutes I was losing sympathy for the film. There is no main character, so there is no one to root for, which is one of the biggest downsides. The action is also very bad, not only is it not bloody and gritty at all, but the soldiers fall to the ground before a bullet reaches them, and at times it seems as if the extras are playing a game among themselves, who will fall the funniest. I also disliked the slow pace, the uninteresting and virtually non-existent story and the ugly, drab visuals. Bottom line, I found no positives here. 10% for the humour. (01/30/2016)

What a pleasant surprise. This should be a mandatory watch for Bay, Ayer, and the like. Maybe they would start making films that have a semblance to reality and historical facts unlike Pearl Harbor and Fury. It was an interesting look into the historical reality in the Baltics, made even better by the fact that this was the first WW2 film I have seen with StG 44 in action. The Estonians show a totally divided war generation, faced with a choice between evil and evil. Although it was clear that things couldn’t possibly turn out well, they didn’t find it necessary to make the ending overemotional, which is so typical of American production. I was thrilled. (08/22/2016)