Sasha-9 Reviews

The Thin Red Line (1998)

For all that didn't get it

[25 December 1998]

After I posted my message I suddenly became a victim of Mallick-fanatics and others that didn't quite get my message.

I never said that we don't need war-films in the future. What I think is that TRL should be made a year before or a year after SPR. That way it would get the admiration and the attention it deserves.

SPR was made by a modern filmmaker, and shows all aspects of war just exacly right. Even the veterans themselves say that it is the greatest war-film ever made. The new growing generation will know what war is like.

What I am trying to say is that we won't be shocked anymore by war-films, like we were shocked seeing SPR for the first time. And therefore TRL will not serve it's original porpouse - showing us that war is hell.

It's great that TRL is made, and the film itself is very good. It has some flawes, but it's one of the best war-films I've seen.

Another war-film that made an enormous impression on me was Andrej Tarkovskij's "Ivan's childhood" - genious film, made by a genious filmmaker.

But still I must say that I've never seen a better war-movie that "Saving Private Ryan"

The Thin Red Line (1998)

Can't be better, than "Saving Private Ryan"

[19 December 1998]

I see it as an impossibility for "The Thin Red Line" to become better than "Saving Private Ryan". I will explain why.

In "Saving Private Ryan", Steven Spielberg has shown us all the aspects of war: how war affects people, what they really had to go through, what happened at home, who fought the war and how they did it.

All this is presented to us in blood and horror.

All this makes "Saving Private Ryan" not only the best and the most realistic war-films ever made, but simply one of the best films ever made by anyone.

Because "Saving Private Ryan" tells everything there is to know about war, the other upcoming war-films are no longer necessary.

Of course you can make a very good war-movie, it's not that. It's simply that it's nothing more to say, it's nothing more to learn, there is nothing more to see.

And I'm sure that many great war-films will be made in the future, and "The Thin Red Line" is one of them, but it will not serve its original purpose, because we already know what war is like.

The Meeting Place Cannot Be Changed (1979)

Superb acting from Vladimir Vysotsky

[14 September 1998]

The film itself is nothing more than a OK detective story, and only the acting of one actor makes it into a great film; as always Vladimir Vysotsky steals the show, and makes the other actors seem just OK. A must see for someone who likes suspense, and great acting.