Last night I rewatched Enemy at the Gates. I always liked this movie but I don't know why. Maybe because there is not much production dealt with Eastern Front from US/West Europe. The production , enviroment etc was all realistic althrough I know that duel between two snipers is complately fictional. What do you think about this movie ?

I wasn't particularly enamored by the movie. Was expecting so much more, judging by the title, which was that of a great book. Essentially, they took a single paragraph out of the book and expanded it grotesquely into a full length movie.

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Best Regards,
JW

I think you've about got it right - the production was high-quality but somehow the characters didn't really work ( and Jude Law to me was almost totally unconvincing...)

The film caused a stir when it was released ( there was a lot of interest in 'Stalingrad' at the time with Beevor's book also on the market ) but I don't think it's stood the test of time.....

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"Stand by to pull me out of the seat if I get hit" - Guy Gibson

I was disappointed with the film also. I concur on the production, but the film is actually based on the propaganda at the time. There was no Major Konig.
I prefer the german movie 'Stalingrad'. It has flaws aswell, but it is a war movie. 'Enemy at the Gates' is an action movie in a WW2 setting.

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'We march. The enemy is retreating in transport. We follow on foot.' Lt.Neil McCallum 5/7 Gordons 19th November 1942

The beginning and Volga crossing were great! later on it went a bit "soft"....

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Iliked it! I agree Kai ti started out with a bang and kind of fizzled out with some interesting moments in between. Overall amybe not accurate, but entertaining!

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Members of the Dutch Resistance with 101st AB, Eindhoven. Operation Market Garden.

Scott

I expected something different but was rather good for what it was. A romance in a war setting. It was made during the period where romance movies set in historical periods. I purchased it and still watch it. But a war movie it is not. I agree, someone took a paragraph from the book and made a movie out of it.

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American by birth, TEXAN by the grace of GOD!

Great start, just a shame about the rest of the film.

Stalingrad is a better movie.
Stalingrad (1993)
Stalingrad (film - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

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Regards, Richard


"Welcome to my new Empire,Doctor."

dump the chic altogether..........I still awai a great air action flick with defense of the Reich agaisnt hordes of B-24's and B-17's, with all the graphic possibilities in this age there could be some wonderful stuff to look forward to.....sorry to wishing to hog this thread

I agree with most. To me the movie was a disappointment......

The movie also included more then just a handfull of hisotircal inaccuracies which didnt sit to well with me or my other Russian buddies who saw the movie. The one instance that really stands out is the way the Soviet soldiers were unlocked from the Boxcar as if they were cattle and then blindly ordered to run into battle by a sound of a whistle.... Insulting.

Here is some more criticism

The Russian Battlefield - ENEMA AT THE DOOR: an Foreigner Will Not Notice, a Russian Will Not Forgive

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The war against Russia will be such that it cannot be conducted in a knightly fashion. This struggle is one of ideologies and racial differences and will have to be conducted with unprecedented, unmerciful and unrelenting harshness. -Adolf Hitler

I guess im in a minority in saying I was not dissappointed in it since I didn't expect too much. I wanted more of a ""Stalingrad"' or a ""Cross of Iron"" kind of movie but; I felt I got my $8.00 bucks worth.

Now is we could only get a good movie made about the Battle of Kursk; THEN we'd be talking! ;-))

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Lost are only those, who abandon themselves) Hans-Ulrich Rudel.

So forgive me but, I take it the book this movie was based upon was really great by all of your standards? I may have to check that out as I initially thought the book was based on the screenplay of the movie, not the other way around!

I like the movie, btw. Not the greatest, not the worst.

Yes the book was good and I recommmend it.
You might can find it in a used book store.

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Best Regards,
JW

I liked it...

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Regards
John

"It is always wise to look ahead, but difficult to look further than you can see" - Winston Churchill

Well, someone had to !

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"Stand by to pull me out of the seat if I get hit" - Guy Gibson

Again I find myself wondering "What exactly is Jude Law for?.." I was once told he was there to specifically indicate any film worth avoiding...

(The 'similar threads' list below is quite funny, crops up a lot this one.)

Cheers,
Adam.

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"Wars cannot be fought with dream stuff" - Sir Percy Hobart.

Yes, the book is worth reading. But make sure you get the book written by William Craig, as Slipdigit showed - sometimes, Hollywood produces novelizations of the movie, with the same title and storyline; that's not what you want.

I agree with Slonik. The egress from the train and the landing was propaganda. They did not throw away lives as it was portrayed in the film. It was a delicate balancing act of keeping enough men on the opposite bank and keeping them supplied enough to hold off the Germans and I have to say it was a masterful act to have pulled it off. I have read much about the battle from the Russian point of view and have read many accounts of how a lot of soldiers wanted to be there. They wanted the privilage to be there more than anything, to be part of the making of history.
Make no mistake, Stalingrad was a bloody affair for all concerned, the Germans threw bodies into the battle just as the Russians did. I saw the movie more than once but the propaganda really taints it for me.

I liked the movie but as others have said the endding got a bit off course.

It did make me think about anouther film that I had forgotton about that was called, ? to the top of the world. It had Willy Nelson and others who got sent to Siberia during WWII and how they survived there. I think the guy was a parachutest and was from America and his parents worked to Ford in Russia before the war. He won a parachute contest but he would not say he was a Russian and wanted to be American so they sent him off to Siberia until he escaped.

It was not too bad of a film about Russia in the late 30's and in the camps they did not even know it was WWII for a long time.

Do any of you remember the name of the film ? I was about 10 years ago.

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Work Harder ! Millions on welfare are depending on you.

Sounds like a decent film but, I don't think I could take Willy Nelson in a war movie?

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Lost are only those, who abandon themselves) Hans-Ulrich Rudel.

TA 152 this wasn't called simply "Gulag" was it ? if so I have seen it twice but do not remember W. Nelson in it. I got to think about a cousin in the Wehrmacht-Heer that was captured and served 7 years in a Soviet gulag only to return to Germany by cart and die along the way ......... a bit disturbing

I found it ! It was from 1982 and called, Coming out of the ice.

Willie has a line in it that says he is going to p*ss on the North Pole one day.

Coming Out of the Ice (1982) (TV)

I don't know where I got the top of the world title from. Senility setting in ?

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Work Harder ! Millions on welfare are depending on you.