T-34

A Russian tank film set in the Second World War. Nikolay is a young tank commander. He is taken prisoner in a fight outside Moscow in 1941. Years later, in a German camp, he is asked to assemble a tank crew to be used as targets in post-battle exercises. He agrees, but his plan is different: get the tank running and escape. The main material is tank combat. The narrative shows it in slow motion, following the path of a shell through the air; the method is display rather than realism. Full-sized vehicles were used and most of the combat was shot physically. The politics are part of the narrative: heroism, homeland and the definition of an enemy are set out directly and the film does not hide it. Alexander Petrov plays Nikolay. Alexey Sidorov directed. The commercial outcome is notable. The film took the highest opening for a domestic production in Russia to that date and became one of the highest-earning Russian films of the post-Soviet period. A showy example of its kind for anyone who likes war films and tank sequences. For a viewer looking for historical depth or restraint, this is openly a heroic narrative and the characters are one-dimensional.