Thread: Война (2002)

An action move about people caught up in the Chechnya war.

Originally Posted by LonelyPlanet

Quote: See this film before considering going anywhere near Chechnya or Dagestan. If you are attracted by the landscape or the culture, go to Georgia instead.

My knowledge about the Chechnya war is a bit sketchy.... but I assume the film was supposed to take place in the late 1990s or so.

Plot: A regular soldier called Ivan, a captain in the Russian army and two Brits (John and Margaret) are taken hostage by some VERY ruthless Chechen separatists.

The Chechens agree to free Ivan and John, but keep the Russian captain and Margaret. The deal is that John must find 2 million dollar as a ransom, or Margaret will be raped and killed.

John goes back to the UK to try to get the government to help (which they don't), alternatively come up with the money for the ransom.

Ivan goes home to Tobolsk (Siberia) but he soon ends up meeting John again.... I will not reveal any more of the plot!

This film has something in common with American films where the hero goes to South America and has a violent adventure among crazy locals and very beautiful landscape. Of course, in this film they never leave the Russian Federation.
Lots of people are killed in this film...

The Chechens are pictured in a very one-sided way: either super-evil, stupid or traitors.
Human nature is more complicated than that, but on the other hand: the film is not intended to be about human nature: it was essentially an action movie about something that probably almost happened for real a few times in the Chechnya war.

John, the Brit is basically useless and rather irritating and Ivan has to save his life more than once.... The acting on part of the non-Russian actors is not that great.

From my perspective 2 stars out of 5. (A guy would probably give a higher rating though.)

This film is available to download with subs in many languages including English.

You should probably keep in mind the personality of Alexey Balabanov, the maker of this film (you probably know him from Брат and Брат 2). He's generally regarded as a racist, anti-semitic, and chauvinistic fellow. He's an US-hater and absolutely not politically correct. Fun though. His films are abundant with all kinds of his prejudices but I think that's why they're so popular.

Regarding "complicated human nature" of Chechens,
(Links are deleted. L.)

I believe Ramil is Muslim and may have biased sentiments toward Chechens.

Perhaps Alexey Balabanov is not politically correct, but THIS makes some his films good. "The War" is a sort of modern fairy tale, though.

Originally Posted by Kudesnik

I believe Ramil is Muslim and may have biased sentiments toward Chechens.

I'm an Orthodox Christian, btw, and I have no 'biased sentiments' towards the Chechenians. And I LIKE Balabanov. But nevertheless I should have pointed out the facts about him to Hanna. Fair is fair, after all.

Hey, Kudesnik, if you don't want to get banned by our dear Lampada don't post the links to Stormfront, just an advice. I don't like Chechens myself, I think that they are mostly banch of barbaric clans whos mediveal behavior is enforced by modern Radical Islamism, but that site is too fvcking racist even for my attitude.

Originally Posted by Basil77

Hey, Kudesnik, if you don't want to get banned by our dear Lampada don't post the links to Stormfront, just an advice. I don't like Chechens myself, I think that they are mostly banch of barbaric clans whos mediveal behavior is enforced by modern Radical Islamism, but that site is too fvcking racist even for my attitude.

Now I am afraid to open these links, but I trust you enough to delete them. Thanks!

Btw, the articles itself were ok, and the second link was from wikipedia. I just made my comment about the site where the first article was. Here is what wiki says about it:

Originally Posted by wikipedia

Stormfront.org is a white nationalist and supremacist neo-Nazi Internet forum that has been described as the Internet's first major hate site.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stormfront_(website)

Oh I didn't know that Balabanov was the same person who made the "Brat" films. But that makes sense. Ivan from Vojna and the Danil character from Brat have a lot in common. This is definitely a guys film.

Chechnya is too complicated for me to have a view on; and I don't know much about the background or the war there...

As I understand it, the current regime there is pro-Russia, but also very muslim, and in favour of muslim law... which is more or less accepted by Moscow, in return for keeping law and order there. Plus, a few people in Chechnya don't accept the existing regime and continue to use terrorism to fight.

I guess everyone who is not a muslim left there a long time ago?

Slavic population in Chechnya decreased from ~60% to 3-4%. Effectively it was an ethnic cleansil.

Regarding Stormfront, I didn't know and didn't care about the site. The link were suggested by Google and just pointed to the article about the fact - in 1998, Chechen bandits kidnapped 4 Western engineers (3 Brits, 1 from NZ), then cut off their heads.

Thanks Kudesnik! Don't worry about the link it was clearly an innocent mistake.

Originally Posted by Basil77

that site is too fvcking racist even for my attitude.

Agree.