Come and See (1985)
Come and become traumatized.
Presentation:
Once in a while a film comes along and changes you. I’ve seen thousands of films, yet it’s this Russian war film that has probably affected me the most. The film begins as an overly-poetic art house film, then a trippy psychodrama before delivering its coup de grâce. Think of if Stalker was a war film. I really liked the color of the film stock, but it was pretty low speed making low light scenes very grainy. I would describe the presentation as technique without the technology. Even though it was filmed in 1985, it looks like it was filmed 10 or 20 years earlier by Hollywood standards. This is pretty common for Russian cinema, focusing on substance rather than visuals. But that just makes the good scenes even more impressive, astonishingly as visceral as Dunkirk. This was accomplished by real bullets and real explosions. Regardless, the visuals are gripping for its highly innovative use of breaking the fourth wall with snoricams/steadicams. At first it seems like a weird gimmick, then 30 minutes in you realize, oh, he’s a genius. The compositions are center framed, which look really good with the tall aspect ratio. You just need to potentially get over the mismatched audio and poor image fidelity, depending on the version you watch.
Analysis:
By locking onto the actors faces, it forces us to confront the war. By breaking the fourth wall, the film is speaking directly to us. When he begins shooting at the portrait, he is both shooting Nazism as well as us, calling on humanity to wake up to the atrocities of war. The fact the film communicates that he hesitated to shoot a baby Hitler I think is actually a more substantial message than I initially thought.
Conclusion:
This is one of the most horrific atrocities I’ve experienced in cinema even more so than Schindler’s List. There are scenes that have left me speechless and I think I’ve seen a lot of disturbing videos. I can’t imagine anyone that doesn’t become radicalized after watching this. Some may argue the cruelness is manipulative propaganda, but the anger feels so personal that it’s hard not to be convinced anyway. Although this is a truly a cinematic experience, I feel compelled to caution anyone about to embark on this traumatic journey that it is not for the faint of heart. Its message is effective but not everyone wants to confront the realities of war.
Recommendations
Is it better to suffer injustice than do it?