Without a doubt the saddest and most haunting ending to any movie i´ve ever seen. These likeable characters, who you see being put through hell on earth again and again, and this is how it all ends. They freeze to death abandoned and forgotten somewhere in the russian wilderness, and are completely covered by snow within minutes. Like they were never even here.
I have seen a lot of war movies with sad depressing endings but this one probably takes the cake. In fact, I would place it in the same degree as Schindler's List (1993).
I remember watching this in the Fourth Grade way back when. After that, I couldn't play WW II games. It racked me with guilt because the haunting melody of this song always popped into my head and I just couldn't continue.
I’m surprised they would show this to kids as young as fourth grade. I’m glad, though; We need to keep teaching about WWII and other tragic historical mistakes in our education systems. It’s our only hope of preventing the worst of history from repeating itself.
So I saw this as a teen in High School. I was always a history buff and a German WW2 film struck me as unique and interesting. I saw this and it had a profound effect on me. I hate to say its PTSD or any kind of trauma but I recall just being so moved by this ending and the facts at the end of the men who never returned home. The senseless death of dying for Stalin or Hitler, 2 monsters. Just utter destruction. And it was real. It happend. Maybe not to these actors but there had been true unspeakable suffering in Europe and Asia and it just did something to me beyond a normal movie watching experience. I remember instances of sitting in class or even at a high school party drinking with friends and girls or just chilling with a friend driving around smoking....I'd be very quiet and they'd always sense something off. I always kept it to myself. I couldn't very well say "Oh Im upset about WW2 and this movie I saw!". They'd think I was nuts. But it was true...I would just sit there and think about that haunting music, the final scene of a brother in arms embracing a dying comrade and doing all he can to comfort him from the icy death that awaits. The millions of nameless dead. And I would lift mg head and gaze around at my friends, stoned or drunk, or sitting in class worried about what they would do for fun that day when school got out, or some girl I liked who was oblivious to me. And none of them knew a damn thing about this nor cared. And that somehow made it worse. These men died and nobody gave a fuck or even acknowledge it. It felt like this personal pain I had. I know this seems so weird but its how I felt TBH. I'm 33 now. And I look back and think rather than sit around feeling hollow and apathetic, I should have lived up each moment. Mayhaps that would have honoured these souls and all the young men and women who never got to experience life, a lot more by doing what they cannot and taking some kind of meaning and lesson from this all. Instead I'd wallowed in it. I always had a severe bout of depression in my life, movies like this and Platoon (which I saw at age 10) always moved me and had such profound effects on my psyche. I'd just feel so torn up for days and weeks. I wonder if others have had similar experiences to mine or if this us normal? Anyhow, I just wanted to express what a great film and soundtrack this is. Thanks
Yes I actually had the same experience like you, ever since I watched this movie while I was in college I stopped playing WW2 video games or any games related to war. It's weird but I felt guilty shooting at those "soldiers". Now I'm a history teacher, I showed this movie to my students everytime I teach about WW2. I am so grateful that thanks to my profession now I'm able to express my feelings about wars in general in today's era where wars are being glorified to young people through games.
Yes I had also same experience. My Grandfather fought Axis side in Rukajärvi he survived and lived until 2005. Might have been very strange feeling who came back alive from Siberia to the Germany in 1955. I have seen British Pathe video about that thing.
These are the real war movies. The ones that aren't afraid to show how horrible it is. But most people only like trashy jingoistic flicks that glorifies war and shooting and they sit there thinking of how "awesome" it was when the hero shot 50 guys down with his machine gun. Makes me sick to my stomach. P.S. If you want some good tips for very good anti-war axis movies. Try "The human condition" It's a pretty long trilogy showing how the war dehumanized an morally righteous Japanese man and turned him into an monster.
I know this comment is three years old but i keep coming back to it. I didn't think anyone else felt this same kind of feeling. I never watched any movies like this, I read lots of books about world war II. But the same thing happened. I was a kid who got into history because it was like an exciting story. But the more I delved into it, the more I found out, the more horrible it all becomes. I remember just like you looking at people and thinking "none of them care, none of them know" I didn't act like I was a veteran or anything it just felt like no one appreciated the sacrafice these people made. and being honest, I probably even didn't. I still am very interested in history and now I'm older I often delve even deeper into these rabbit holes of things that happened during war. And its honestly so brutal. Even when people make jokes about things like ww2, I sometimes laugh because I understand them, but then I question how I even can. How could I possibly laugh at the nightmare these innocent men, some not much older than me, experienced? I completely understand what you mean, I hope that humanity can someday cast aside our differences, finally end the mindless horror, killing, and death we continue to inflict upon one another.
For me this is the most powerful scene of the film. I can't help the feeling that these men didn't surrender because they wanted to die. They must have known they were going to die. War is hell and life after it is a bitch.
Блестящая работа актёров, передана история, судьбы, хочется сказать одно царство небесное бойцам РККА, и простым парням из Вермахта и чтобы такое больше не было
Wenns im Winter saukalt ist und ich zur schule geh, denk ich mir nich "mann is mir kalt" bei den Temperaturen die wir hier im winter haben, könnte man sich dafür schämen zu sagen "Mir ist kalt" wenn man bedenkt was unsere Großväter miterleben und fühlen mussten....
When I was watching this movie for the first time, at the end I thought that it just can't be the end. Every war movie that I watched ended with happy ending! But then credits started showing up an I already knew, that this is the end... Best war movie ever!
Me too brother. I watched this for the first time for some months ago and I just couldn’t cry to the ending. I just sat there devastated with a horrible feeling in my stomach.
So naive, sadly... That there is the oversimplistic left-wing and pacifistic presentation of the fact that before a war comes a row. For war to happen requires only one.... And war isn't Elitist either; again, one of the left-wings absurd and false statements. War is the continuation of policy. Life isn't as simplistic as that statement..
This movie deserves alot more than the 3 stars it was given on the DVD cover. Must've been reviewed by Americans or people without historical appreciation.
My great grandpa was in stalingrad as a german. He was wounded there badly (3 rips got shot) and took a plane out of there sometime after christmas i think, maybe one of the last flights. He later fought in czech at the end of the war and got captured. He and two others managed to flee but one of them got shot. I know storys how you could hear the russians just one floor above you in the night... He was awarded with an iron cross (i don't know which class) and a close combat award. he had hell of a ptsd... Waking up and screaming the shit out of his body. His name was Heinz Menz...
My grandmother was a Yugoslavian partisan and she also had ptsd. She died in 2010 and even before death she was cursing German Nazis. My grandfather was also partisan, 3 medals, fought against Germans. He told me a lot of brutal stories. I have wrote memoirs of him and grandma on 25 pages. Thank you for your great story. I hope so that we Yugoslavians will never again fight against Germans. There was enough of wars.
This is one of my favourite war films, love the arc from the happy time in Italy to their ultimate end in Russia, a true soldier's story. Love the soundtrack as well. Never realised the Lt Witzland in this film was played by actor Thomas Kretschmann who has been in some of the best war films ever made.
He's one of My favourite honorary German actors. He's been in so many movies war and alike. He plays a bad guy that's likeable and good guy that's bad in a likeable way. Not sure why he doesn't have an several Oscars by now.
An amazing and well made film of the insanity of war. These men entered Russia believing they were the finest, unbeatable soldiers on earth. So many forgotten and lost to time now. Families who would never know of their true fate.
And there they sat... and lay... like those that came before them, the French soldiers of Napoleons Grand Arméer who too froze to death... In Flanders fields the poppies grow... but in the frozen lands of Russia, nothing grows, nothing lives, and all who ventures there are met with the same fate: death by starvation, frost, or combat.
I'm spanish and my grandfather was member of Division 250 (spanish volunteers) He fight in another great battle: Leningrad. He had good friends in German Army. When the War finished he help many german friends for go to Spain.
the soundtrack fits the ending like a glove. on the other hand, i really appreciate a movie which shows just how human the Germans soldiers were. ppl should start making a difference between the politics which went on in Berlin and the life of the ordinary enlisted man who was forced to fight someone else's war
Les films allemands sur la 2nd guerre mondiale ont toujours un grain special, beaucoup de realisme dans les faits et dans la psychologie des personnages ... je pense notamment a 'the boat' , ' la chute ', 'le pont ', ... Bien que la barbarie et l'atrocité soit montrée avec plus de realisme ce film me parait plus juste et humain que le stalingrad de 2013.
This movie shows the true horror of The Battle of Stalingrad Edit: I just thought of something Horrible: As Accurate and Sad as this Film was, it still doesn’t compare to the Real Thing
dimeconcac,very nice of ya to share this, jus watched this film for the very 1st time & all i can say it gets me right hear hand on heart they are heroes hail Stalingrad 10/10 & thanx too Norbert J. Schneider - Stalingrad (Finale)another 10/10 both epic.
This movie is an important one because it displays the suffering of war through the German's eyes, a point of view almost never seen. I know my grandfather did not go through this shit for 4 years to be forgotten and on top of that, be labeled as a monster. People don't realize that the average German soldier was, an excellent soldier, had family and friends like other soldiers, suffered through extreme horror, and was spit on after the war, even to this very day. It is a shame we forget this.
Must say that the German WW2 movies are way better then the american ones. The best movies I´ve seen on the topic is Stalingrad, Das Boot and Der Untergang. They show war for what it really is, not like the glorifying american films like Black Hawk Down or We were soldiers, "We will bring our boys back!"
Hitler must be in the lowest, hottest part of hell right now. With many hundreds of millions dying because of his war he must be drowning in a sea of blood. My heart goes out to the many millions on both sides who perished at Stalingrad. May they all RIP.
Love this film like anything. 5 stars We shall never forget what these brave solideres did not just the germans but everyone who fought in war there sacrifices will never be forgotten. A lot of the german soldiers were forced to fight. I'm from the United kingdom but there's one thing about the germans they didn't give up without a fight. got to give them credit for that. Anybody know I can get this soundtrack.
Stalingrad.... Probably the bloodiest battle in human history. The movie says the deaths were more than 1,000,000, it was actually more like 1,500,000. And of the 850,000 or so Germans and allies who served in the battle, only 31,000 survived. (6,000 survived as prisoners of war and 25,000 escaped the encirclement be plane). That means only one out of 25 axis soldiers in the battle lived. That's probably the largest death ratio in any battle in history. Modern stalingrad is covered in blood.....
Very sad young man died for nothing they deserve much better life most of them wasn't there because they like that 😢 and no winner and will never be a winner
