MovieChat Forums > Utomlennye solntsem 2 (2010) Discussion > Saw it.

Saw it.

posted 14 years ago by glasha-1
10 replies | jump to latest

Our event-agency organized the Moscow premier so I got the chance to see it.
The first film won an Oscar for Best Foreign Film and this one made Cannes 2010 line-up.
To be honest I'm not sure what to made of it. Of course the subject matter is very difficult - it's not a movie that set in war time it's a war film. During Red Cross scene I started weeping and couldn't stop until it was over. I can't remember what was the last time when I cried during movie. The first half was fantastic I even thought that Best Foreign Film nom is a given, conserving how much the love Mikhalkov.

The acting was fantastic, though it has something to do that almost every supporting role and cameo was played by Russia's greatest actors - that was a great gift, that you not getting every day. I can only dream of seeing a movie that will include Robert De Niro, Ralph Fiennes, Daniel Day-Lewis, Anthony Hopkins, Leonardo DiCaprio, Meryl Streep, Cate Blanchett, Julianne Moore, Russell Crowe, Robert Duvall etc.
Nikita Mikhalkov himself played the lead role of Col. Sergei Petrovich Kotov, with his real-life daughter Nadezhda Mikhalkova playing leading role of Kotov's daughter Nadezhda, his son Artyom Mikhalkov played supporting role of a soldier and his older daughter Anna Mikhalkova will appear in third part.
Nikita Mikhalkov was good, but nothing extraordinary, his daughter Nadezhda, who is not a professional actress, was surprisingly impressive. The best performances were given by two great actors - Oleg Menshikov as antagonist Mitya and Yevgeni Mironov.
Some can say the movie is too pretentious, well all I know that the tagline is sure is ('great film about great war').
Most of us who saw it thought that 3 hours is too long and that a little editing wouldn't hurt. Some simply hated it.

There is a third and last part of this epic story that will open in October, 2010.

FYC: Three-time Academy Awards nominee Angela Lansbury for an Honorary Oscar

[–] alilley72 14 years ago

Thanks for your review.

I was just looking at the news before I came here to report the sighting of the first article abut the premier in the Moscow Times.

http://www.themoscowtimes.com/news/article/6000-flock-to-kremlin-for-b urnt-by-the-sun-sequel/404158.html

How did you feel about all the old characters being "resurrected" for part 2?

[–] glasha-1 14 years ago

Of course I assumed that Kotov was killed and Mitya committed suicide, but it's been 16 years since I saw the first film, so to be honest I never even thought about it.

FYC: Three-time Academy Awards nominee Angela Lansbury for an Honorary Oscar

[–] alilley72 14 years ago

Thanks :)

[–] glasha-1 14 years ago

You're welcome. Reviews so far are mostly mixed or negative.

FYC: Three-time Academy Awards nominee Angela Lansbury for an Honorary Oscar

[–] gnolti 14 years ago

I think Mikhalkov did his characters a disservice by rewriting their fates as outlined at the end of US1. Once you've killed a character, they're dead, unless you're writing a soap opera.

Why didn't he simply create new characters for this story?

There, daddy, do I get a gold star?

[–] vladimir-721-637275 14 years ago

Well, I'm from "simply hated it" camp.

On whole, too long, too egocentric, too hilarious, ... too much for the guy who knew "Friend Among Strangers, Stranger Among Friends" of Mikhalkov.

The epic film about WWII turned out to epic fail of a great artist.

[–] never1and 14 years ago

Too long, too disconnected and too boring, but at least it's epic and we actually can see where $50m of taxpayers were spent. There wasn't a lot of good Russian movies recently anyway.

[–] Xenia_MUC 14 years ago

I agree with neverland: the film is boring and disconnected. There is no clear storyline there. Well, there is one, which does not tell us anything new.

As for the greatest Russian actors, well, I would say they are great, however, not in this movie. Their parts are incomplete, badly written, the characters emerge from nowhere and disappear in nowhere. The film is similar to a old patchwork carpet dusty and torn...

[–] Nihilismm 14 years ago

It is awful compared to #1.

[–] samanthaseaotter 14 years ago

So sorry to hear all this. When I read years ago that he was making a sequel, I assumed that it was a similar theme with different characters at a different period of time.

My guess is that the new characters he was writing were too close to the old characters (especially with the same actors) so he just gave up and used the old characters. Which makes less than no sense.

The first movie was a rhapsody, a symphony of color, nuance, texture, humor, sadness, joy, tragedy. It sucked you into a bucolic day with an earthquake rumbling below the surface. It was a masterpiece.

Just like "Godfather I" and "II" - "III" was such a stinker that that was that, and they closed the franchise. (Of course, Mario Puzo was already dead.)

On the other hand, Sofia Coppola is a horrible actress but a gifted director. Maybe something like that could come out of this garbage?

Samantha
"We're here. We're dead. Get used to it."