Emigholz (The Radioman who died after having his leg blown off and amputated at the aid station) told the other men earlier in the movie that as soon as the war would be won he wanted to become a football (soccer) player for his favourite team, earning laughters from his comrades. This Film is gruesome down to its tiniest details.
Yes, he told that as a joke. Overstating it to make the other guys laugh. Which is something I also found remarkable in this movie. The soldiers try their best initially to keep each other's spirits up. With quibs, jokes, taunts and the like. But that all grows less and less as the movie progresses.
The German perspective is cool and I do love the movie but it's very frustrating how few good movies there arm from the Red Army perspective, and please no one bring up Enemy at the Gates, that movie is borderline fiction once you start researching it.
@@grindcoreninja6527 Don't you worry, already seen Unsere Mutter, Unsere Vater twice! Wouldn't put it on the same level as Stalingrad but definitely an amazing show.
I didn't understand that scene 1) why just shoot the woman and not the German guys 2) why did they not take food and supplies from the bunker to make the journey
As a german, who is also a HUGE fan of this movie, i am very happy to see this film finally getting the international appreciation it rightfully deserves. This Film, together with Bernhard Wicki's "Die Brücke" (the Bridge) and Wolfgang Petersen's "Das Boot" is basically the holy trinity of german Anti-War movies, because they perfectly nail it. Making the audience getting personally involved with the faces and humans who were put into the uniforms and sent out to kill their brothers and sisters who the government told them was their enemy now.
KRAFTWERK2K6 The film is an absolute masterpiece, alongside Downfall and Cross of iron. It's just a great pity, that the human race is so dumb, that history will keep repeating itself.
One of the things I noticed about the film is how civilization crumbles around them the further the conflict goes. When we first see them in Italy its beautiful and sunny, and they're able to enjoy the surrounding area including food and drink. Then once they reach Stalingrad and the battle commences, everything falls apart. Until it reaches a point where there's literally nothing but ice and snow. No real buildings to seek refuge in, no food, no provisions, and no people. They've been wiped out due to the harshness of war. Thus leaving these men to die in a barren land where nothing lives.
The most disturbing part of the film for me was when they found the Russian girl handcuffed to the German officer's bed. At first I was thinking, "oh, they're going to free her," but they just kept staring at her, then one told the highest ranking guy that he could go first and they left him alone with her. He ended up freeing her instead, but the moment still haunted me.
6:56 I have to add that this line hits hard not only because the dead can no longer cry, but most of the men have become so desensitized to war and death that they CANNOT cry anymore. It shows that displaying basic human emotions in a time of war seems weird but in actuality it's the majority of the soldiers that are acting strange.
I think the scene where he says be glad you can still cry wasn't about being thankful you're still alive to cry but because he's seen so much horror that he emotionally can't cry for anything or anyone anymore! The war has taken his humanity and in some ways that's much worse than death!
What gives me chills, is that they refer wounded or dead comrades as "kaputt" or broken. This and the Grey uniforms, helmets, their nearly machanical fighting and the industrial portrail of the city really shows that these men are more machines than humans.
I believe that's a fairly natural reaction, to being surrounded by so much suffering and unspeakable misery. Your emotions can't handle the implications of the same happening directly to you, so you numb them to avoid going crazy with terror.
Saw this movie on Netflix way back when Netflix mailed DVDs to your house. I was probably around 11 at the time & this movie traumatized me like no other. About 2 years ago I sought it out again and bought a copy. It's an absolute masterpiece and way more people need to see it. Easily the best film ever made about the Battle of Stalingrad.
On the crying comment from Fritz who says "you should be glad you can still cry" -it foreshadows the ending when he freezes to death holding Witzland and says "it's too cold to cry". The best ending to any war film ever.
Easily the most underrated war movie I've ever seen. Only one that shows that not every German was a Nazi. A bunch of them were normal ass dudes who were told they have to fight for their country. And millions of them died for nothing in Russia.
The whole ordeal of demonizing all WW2 Germans and Nazis and making the Nazis ALL literal psychopaths and literal monsters does major discredit to what the real evil was - human beings. Ever since the war ended they did everything they could to dehumanize them but they forget that such treatment allows such things to be repeated more easily by forgetting that ANY group around the world is capable of such things. Additionally you have to humanize them as well to understand that they weren't all the same. The majority of those dudes just wanted to go home and be with their families and be done with it (just like normal people). The post-war narrative is just absolutely disgusting.
A movie very similar to this is Das Boot. Also a German war movie which follows a German U-Boat crew through the war. Quite a gritty, nightmarish and claustrophobic movie that deserves a nightmare fuel video.
@@UnleashTheGhouls there was an extended tv show version of the 81 movie (5h long), which is the proper way of watching this masterpiece. the 2018 is not even close to the original
I'd disagree that the begining of the film presents German soldiers as unlikeable. I actually think it's the exact opposite. They're depicted just like soldiers actually behave on leave after heavy combat. Drunk, looking for women, and trying to squeeze as much out of the few days or weeks that they have knowing there's more hell in store for them in the future. If anything, it paints the picture that they're just like the rest of us. They're shown taking care of their former platoon leader even though he's been wounded and will never be the same. They're seen chasing after girls... really this is accurate of any soldiers. Young guys, who've just come through hell and now have some time to kick back and relax... I find them extremely likeable and that's the point. The writers are showing us they're not so different from us.
Being from the states I can't help but admire foreign(to me at least) movies. No Hollywood hero BS, just straight up realism, this movie pounds it home, a straight up raw perspective that ends the only way it could.
The combat scene when the characters are sent off to the penal battalions could’ve been done a bit better (not too realistic + anachronistic tanks) but as a set piece and to show them redeeming themselves and returning to their former units/rank, it’s done well. There’s also the whole discussion where the execution scene with the boy was exaggerated etc, but personally I could look over these because they helped get a point across and were super gripping emotionally, helping us sympathize with the main characters. I like nitpicking inaccuracies for fun but unless they’re very common or get in the way of the movie (or even hurt it) I wholeheartedly agree, the movie generally did a good job with details (shouldn’t Rollo have his cuff for fighting in Egypt) and battle scenes, set pieces, characters and story. It came off as generally gritty and raw, showing the depravity and horrors of the eastern front and Stalingrad.
The film doesn't exaggerate at all: The advisor to the movie, Hans-Erdmann Schönbeck who was himself a veteran of the Stalingrad encirclement said, when he was in the field hospital wounded with a punctured lung & a back injury while waiting for treatment, he got to watch people being amputated without anesthetic for hours. Conditions were even worse in the narrow perimeter on the west bank of the Volga river the Soviets bitterly clang to before the encirclement. There novice surgeon Anisim Moisenko had his undersupplied operating theatre in a small dugout. A lot of times when he had no morphine left he had to resort to injecting vodka instead. Ultimately, the scope of the fighting & suffering cannot truthfully be depicted for its sheer scale. Never forget the battle for what it was, rougly a million people died in & around Stalingrad.
The creepiest scene in the movie for me is when the soldiers find the sex slave in Haller's house and they coldly say "we'll go by rank". And when she screamed "fuck me and shoot me!" chills went down my spine.
Just for people that havent seen the movie - the Germans do not rape the women then. The officer saves her since he met her earlier and doesnt want to go down to that level. Its still a horrifying scene on so many levels.
The soldier who’s body was blown in two dying so suddenly and abruptly really got me. Shows you that you don’t die a slow, graceful death like in the movies.
Watch Ukraine videos on anywhere but RUclips. You can't imagine the reality of combat. It's both exactly what you expect and still something you can't know.
5:15 you mentioned how you wondered how many people were killed due to inaccurate weaponry which just boils down to being an accident and boy you wouldn't believe just how many deaths were due to accidents in WW2 and in pretty much every war since. Even in my own experience in war during the Iraq War in 2005 we had a quarter of our battalion's deaths being caused by accidents/negligence.
I saw this movie in the cinema in 93 when I was 13. It gave me nightmares for days and the tankscene still gives me goosebumps to this day. It's a very good movie.
Not a fun, but a fact: The tank scene really happend. At school we discussed that scene under the aspect of euthanasia to facilitate the sure death of a dying person. That was in the 90's, long before that movie. This scene has also haunted me for years.
6th Army was the greatest tragedy of the 2nd World War. Hitler basically gave their lives away. 6th Army and her allied support were encircled, butchered, then suffered the indignity of POW camps and servitude for an additional 5 or more years after the war ended. It was thought that perhaps 6 thousand survivors of Stalingrad returned to their own countries of origin. Luckily Hitler was a poor general, in the end, but not lucky if you were a soldier in one of his armies.
That scene where the plane leaves didn’t get the recognition it deserves, truly hell on earth the idea that this plane is their last chance of ever getting out of that place, and the desperation of people to get on the plane as it takes off
The part about being glad you can still cry isn't just about the dead not being able to but about soldiers who are still alive but have lost the ability to cry. Trauma can do a variety of strange things to people and one of them is to remove their ability to feel certain emotions or much of any emotions at all. Trauma can tear away a good portion of the individual's humanity.
@@nm7358 Cross of Iron is based on a book called 'The Willing Flesh' which was written by Willi Heinrich, who was German. yes, the film was made by a largely American crew and director with American and British cast members, but it also features a lot of German actors aswell. The country of genesis is kinda irrelevant imo. it still carries the same message as Stalingrad.
@@joemammon6149 My apologies, I got mixed up as I've I thought I'd heard Crimea referred to as 'Where The Iron Crosses Grow'. Appreciate the correction, thank you :)
A little historic detail is that you see some of the Germans using captured Soviet PPSH Sub-machine guns. This is because the battle in Stalingrad was so close quarters that enemy soldiers would fight room to room in a single building. This rendered single shot, bolt action rifles unpopular among some Germans, so they opted to swap them with rapid fire Soviet SMGs, and this became so common that the German army started handing out manuals on how to operate these guns, and convert them to use standard 9mm ammunition.
@@teo.took.40.benadryl it was more a difference in German army doctrine The Germans issued MP40s to Squad Leads, scouts, engineers, and Panzergrenadiers, leaving the rest of the squad with either a machine gun or rifle The Soviets meanwhile were deploying entire squad with PPSHs as their main weapons, with one or 2 men using MGs
Any german soldier refusing orders was placed into a 'punishment battalion' mine clearing was one of their deadly duties. The german 6th army in Stalingrad was left to its fate by Hitler even though a break through there was an attempted rescue German troops either died of starvation or froze to death possibly both. General Friedrich Paulus was eventually forced to surrender his men against Hitlers express wishes in doing so. 90,000 german soldiers went into captivity around 5,000 came home.
Another thing of note regarding the snow battle scene. This was before the German army was issued weapons such as the Panzerfaust and Panzershreck, which offered their troops the ability to effectively knock out enemy tanks from a certain distance. As a result, and as seen in the battle, German infantry had to use anti-tank weapons that they had to throw towards a tank up close and personal. Molotovs, Bundle grenades, and magnetic tank grenades. All of which required the soldiers to be extremely close in order to properly disable a tank.
The film really had an impact on me. I am so fascinated by the Eastern Front, as an American, they never taught us about this part of the war in school.
The pianist was one of the only movies to have me sit locked to the screen for the entire runtime, I haven’t found a movie as heartbreaking nor could draw me in such a way
Sometimes the scariest horror movies are based on events that actually happened. It's called "Life." And "War." So many young men, so many names, forgotten, lost in battle. And for what? Glory? It's downright terrifying and depressing to see. I also must say. This video, and this analysis of this movie, you did an amazing job on.
Precisely! It's as if we refuse to own that actual PEOPLE did these things. Not monsters, not aliens, not some metaphysical devil-man Hitler, but actual PEOPLE. The double-side being that normal people also endured these horrors as those who just wanted to be done with it. It's amazing that such strenuous arguments have to be made that "Germans in WW2 were people too". But that's how brainwashed the entire world was after the war.
my grandfather was one of the german soldiers in stalingrad. i don't know terribly much about it, but i do know that frostbite made him lose his toes while on the way there, and that his head eventually got "grazed" by an artillery shrapnel, which heavily wounded him by shaving off some of his skullcap. he survived, probably thanks to that wound, as he was on one of the last planes that evacuated from stalingrad before the city got fully encircled. i never got to see that wound on his head (i only knew him wearing his hat) , but i got told that his brain remained visible.
8:10 my grandfather was in Germany, and he handed a little german girl a Chocolate bar after asking her mother if it was ok, after he handed it to her, mere seconds, a mortar hit the ground very close to him, he got blown back, and after he got back up, he carried that same german girl that was killed by the mortar back to his mother , I believe he only talked about that once to my uncle
"Be glad you can still cry" isn't a reference to the dead. It's even worse. He's saying that war has traumatized others so much that they cannot even cry about it anymore. They have lost that feeling. They have lost their humanity. At least, that's how I've always interpreted it.
One of my favorite line is when otto says "My flesh melts and seeps into my bone every night but i put myself back everytime for that none of you can kill me" Otto is an interesting character in this movie imo
I still remember seeing this movie by accident somewhere in late 1995 on TV together with my sister and we were both absolutely traumatized. I kept thinking of that movie for a few years till a friend in school back in 1998 or 99 borrowed me his VHS copy so i could watch the whole movie. It was gutwrenching but i realized how good the movie was and i was baffled by its FSK12 age rating, which means anyone the age of 12 and up can watch it.
We watched it at school once. I think we were 13 back then. In Austria and Germany that is quite normal I would say. Not to watch this exact movie, but Schindler's List, the Pianist, die Wannseekonferenz and so on. They want the kids to see and feel the horror of the ns-regime in order to make you feel guilty.
@@derKrampus Yeah they waste no time to make you feel guilty in school. We had almost a whole year of history class only WWII. So much so it was really getting annoying. because it felt like being educated by the Media. And of course we only watched "Shindler's List" and "Der Hitlerjunge Salomon". It was very one sided and never really anti-war but always only like "look what happened to the jews! Don't focus on anything else!" which i really felt like completely disregarding everything that the war did to everyone else. It's a shame because "Stalingrad" and "Die Brücke" would have deserved more to be shown. About how people are manipulated into fighting and the pointless cruelty that results in it. That would have been a much stronger message to Students instead of just getting guilt-tripped into feeling bad for being German or Austrian.
the crying part was completely misinterpreted it was more about that those who cant cry anymore have it worse. Meaning the people that got too used to it
I have only seen this film once, and it is easily one of the WWII films that has stuck with me even with just that one viewing. I think the scene where I accepted all the main characters were going to die was when they missed the plane. I think they knew that too even after they found the cellar with the abundance of supplies. I felt especially bad for GeGe, and I think the characters in films like these I always relate to the most are ones like him or Blithe in Band of Brothers, even. I am a huge overthinker and there is no way I would ever get thrown into a situation like this and be able to apply Fritz's advice to just shut it all off and "not think." Unfortunately I'd probably be that soldier who got blown up in the crater. Your entire 18-20 something years of being raised, taught, trained by your parents, teachers, peers, family, etc. in the hopes of becoming a great man snuffed out in just a few seconds by an enemy you never had any hope of seeing, much less stopping.
one of the few movies that shows this period and its soldiers as what it is, just young men in a situation they dont want to be in. Not everyone was a nazi, most hated the nazis and what they did. And im glad this movie gets a bit attention
Captain Musk is the type of officer German soldiers would follow through hell and back. We witness him in the beginning, keeping his cool in all circumstances and totally ruthless in his objectives. Despite having lost his left forearm being in the thick of it and leading by example. The second time with a camarady attitude, sharing his last cigar with his men after another grueling engagement, and pulling the cannon with them through the cold and snow. The third and last time being ravaged by disease, hunger and frostbite, and looking utterly sad and desillusioned. But even then his NCO Rohleder still puts his trust in him, carrying him, while he is actually dying. An excellent officer, the German counterpart of captain Miller in 'Saving private Ryan' (Rangers are Pioniere!) who died a senseless and useless death.
Stalingrad and Red Angel (1966) are my two favorite war films of all time. Both are super bleak and shows that war only produces suffering and a large pile of corpses.
German artillery doctrine in ww1/2 was that friendly infantry needs to be able to absorb 10/15% casualties from their own artillery to be able to be an effective attacking force
The movie is really well done, the thing that shocked me the most in the end was the fact that only 6000 germans survived the russian prison. After my grandmothers husband passed away, she lived together with a man called Bruno for probably 15-25 years, I don‘t really know about their relationship but they apparently were just life partners. Bruno passed away around 2015-2017 and what I found out a couple years later was, that he fought in Stalingrad as a german soldier, ended up in russian prison and came back home alive. I didn‘t meet him often and was about 11-13 when he passed away but in a way it felt like he was my grandfather since I never met my real grandfather. My father told me about his life story and that he fought in Stalingrad only about 1-2 years ago but until today I didn‘t know how few german soldiers actually made it out. He spoke russian really well so that‘s why he probably came by quite good but it‘s still so unreal to me that he was there. He was a very wise man and always seemed very reflected about his own life. Now all his achievements seem even greater to me considering what he has seen and experienced. It‘s now that I hoped I would‘ve been older around that time to hear his thoughts and maybe stories he is willing to share. Great video by the way
Fritz, when saying at least you can still cry is also probably in reference to the men who are still alive, but have lost their ability to respond emotionally. "shell shock" as it was called left millions of men and probably many female nurses, and others in places where there was so much violence and loss and brutality that their brains literally STOPPED responding to what was going on around them. They just did their jobs without really thinking anymore.
The fact that almost 2 million people died in a battle for a single city and its surrounding areas is mind boggling. We really can’t even begin to visualize what that looked like or felt like. There’s not a single comparison to something on that scale.
5:49 i hate to disagree with you, but that response wasn't malice, it was the man who tried to save him coping with the fact one of his friends just got exploded.
I need to give this one another shot - I took it as a major step down from STALINGRAD DOGS DO YOU WANT TO LIVE FOREVER with a lot of CROSS OF IRON and ATTACK AND RETREAT mixed in.
Stalingrad (1993) is one of those films I can always rewatch, was also the reason why got a dragon figure collectable from this battle. (also have one from the battle of Ardennes)
It's only too bad they left the stocks folded on their MP-40s. As for friendly artillery fire, that also happened in Vietnam. It was depicted in both 'Platoon' and 'We Were Soldiers'.
Der Hauptmann, Das Boot, the original Stalingrad (Dogs, Do you want to live forever?), Der Untergang, etc. are all masterpieces made away from the glittery and biased limelight of Hollywood.
@@BlutUndEhre88 Sure - there's one made in 1959 and a remake in 2008. Both are German & Subtitled so you may have to search "Die Brücke". Can't find links but if you take to the seas matey, you'll find 'em.
This movie and the depiction of this battle must feel very strange to people from the Anglosphere who are more used to movies from the Western Front or the pacific front, like Saving Private Ryan and Thin Red Line. Horrible battles, no doubt in that, but the Eastern Front was something else. The German war against the Soviet Union was not a war that fits into the scheme of classic wars, which exists in the minds of people from the US and England-It was a war of annihilation. The German leadership with its ideology was determined to wipe out Bolshevism and not only the Red Army, but the Soviet people itself, as they were not seen as humans, or of equal worth. And if the Germans would not succeed, the leadership (moustache guy and his buddies) was ready to sacrifice Germany and its people for it. So it was wiping the other people (not only the country and the army, but the whole ethnicity) from the face of the earth or getting wiped out by trying. Moustache guy and his buddies wanted to get "Lebensraum" for his "superior race". The behaviour of the German soldiers in this movie was quite precise. They grew up in times of the Great Depression. Right after Germany started to get its stuff together after WWI and things started to get better, the financial crisis hit hard and from the ongoing political turmoils the moustache guy and his buddies emerged. Living standards in the rural areas were still worse than the ones in the Anglosphere. Families with up to 10 kids in the countryside were quite common to secure the family. More kids equals better chances that one kid might make something good out of his/her life. Combine that with a hierarchical society, were the the families of the aristocracy and the bourgeoisie are seen worth more in every aspect of live and you will receive cynical soldiers with a strong sense of duty. You can't compare that mindset to the invidualistic mindset of the people from the 21st century. Dying for a higher good was expected. I am pretty sure, that they felt that it sucked. But on the other hand, they can't complain, since the hierarchical structures of the society were still very much in place. Edit: PS: Good video. I like, that the movie finally gets some recognition.
Hitler: We are going to invade Russia next Soldiers: We are going to get winter coats right? Hitler:... Soldiers: We are going to get winter coats...right?
It's easier to create a much truer anti-war film when you see it from the German side. They were fighting for an evil cause, one they wasted their lives for. On the other hand, the allied soldiers were fighting evil. And from the Allied side, it's impossible to make a true anti-war film set in World War II because the war was worth the sacrifice - as terrible as it may have been.
What I like the most about Stalingrad is the fact that it neither glorifies nor demonises the German soldiers. The characters are morally negative (their approach to combat, the mocking of slave laborers, the initial treatment of the kidnapped girl by everyone but Hans), but at the same time their behaviour is explained (partially justified too) and we, as the viewer, are able to sympathise with them a little - or at least form a connection with them, until the inevitable befalls them.
I Think its a dark detail in the film is ammo and food shortages, leading the germans to use PSSH (russian sub machine guns) And no spared details or gore/grime, Triage is being performed due to medical desperation , even inaccurate artirelly and foggy days of stalingrad leading to friendly fire
I found this movie both fascinating and visceral,the combat scenes are pretty raw without sparing the senses,there’s little in the way of a respite from the horrors of the war…a stark and unforgiving reminder of what happens when man loses his humanity…..
I remember as a Kid at this Time so have really bad nightmares from this excellent Movie My Grandfather survived Stalingrad but even on the begining of the War He knew that He and his (common) Men were only cannon fodder for the brown Nazi scum.
life is horrible and we are not better than people of that age also moment Feldman triggers his rifle is not "starting a conflict" but losing stealth which was as deadly as depicted
Probably the best film depiction of the battle of Stalingrad, I know it’s not a high bar, most film’s showing the battle are not very good, but this one is very well done. The 2013 film of the same name had over 3 times the budget, and was garbage
5:00 That's a myth. German artillary was pretty accuacy. But of you are in the middle of a battle inside a city where the occupation of an area changes hourly, then it can happen that you it your own men.
I'm not sure it's even a myth, I never heard about German arty in WW2 was inaccurate. It wasn't the best of all nations involved, but it wasn't bad at all.
you forgot one of the most important scenes: almost at the end of the movie where the first 2 germans where one carried the dying squad leader went outside to face the enemy but they encounter the general/high rank officers who were not on the frontlnes and they went to surrender. felt like those german soldiers fought and died in vain and mostly betrayed
Western MSM made it up. there was no way 40k Russian where going to storm a city of 2 million while being out numbered by a large ukro army and militia.
@@dontatmebitches Yes there were 3 verisons of Das Boot, a 1.5 hour theatrical version, a 3.5 hour directors cut and a 6 episode TV version. The TV Version is the only one worth watching in my opinion. Excellent character building which captures the anti war theme on the story best. ( I posted a previous comment but it seems to have been deleted) Heres a link to a brilliant doc that explains how they made this film in 1981 (in german with subtitles). ruclips.net/video/olR9l4I3xO0/видео.html
The one criticism I have with this film were the hard cuts to different scenes. Particularly their entry to the battle, you don’t see them crossing the Volga or something like the beach landing in Private Ryan, it just smash cuts to the middle of battle right from the debriefing. Also there were at times the smash cuts happen to different parts of one room and I easily got lost as to what part of the room we were looking at. Oh and we never saw what happened to the Russian soldiers in the sewers after they were directed by the mother where the Germans went. I felt like there was a chase scene missing. And they never went back for the rest of the unit after the German supply drop scene. Why didn’t they bring the rest to the stocked cellar? But apart from that, there were some beautiful shots in this film, the opening in Italy, the soldiers all pulling the cannon through the snowy wasteland, and the final shot of Fritz and the Lieutenant as the end credits roll. Very emotionally effective film.
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Emigholz (The Radioman who died after having his leg blown off and amputated at the aid station)
told the other men earlier in the movie that as soon as the war would be won he wanted to become a football (soccer) player for his favourite team,
earning laughters from his comrades.
This Film is gruesome down to its tiniest details.
Yes, he told that as a joke. Overstating it to make the other guys laugh. Which is something I also found remarkable in this movie. The soldiers try their best initially to keep each other's spirits up. With quibs, jokes, taunts and the like.
But that all grows less and less as the movie progresses.
He even has a tattoo of his club on his arm (train ride at the beginning) - it's Schalke04
@@andidollinger7062 hes is from bremen and cleary states werder bremen mate
Has to be my favorite WW2 movie. The German perspective and the movie being in German makes it so powerful.
It's crazily powerful, an underappreciated masterpiece!
The German perspective is cool and I do love the movie but it's very frustrating how few good movies there arm from the Red Army perspective, and please no one bring up Enemy at the Gates, that movie is borderline fiction once you start researching it.
You'd enjoy the limited series "Generation War".
It's also from the German perspective.
@@grindcoreninja6527 Don't you worry, already seen Unsere Mutter, Unsere Vater twice! Wouldn't put it on the same level as Stalingrad but definitely an amazing show.
The nazi perspective is a morbid curiosity at best
The last scene of them freezing in the snow brought tears to my eyes. Truly a masterpiece of a movie.
And the woman Russian soldier with them gunned down by her own side.
I didn't understand that scene
1) why just shoot the woman and not the German guys
2) why did they not take food and supplies from the bunker to make the journey
last words were "cold is better than the hot stuff yknow" and died
@@Ilondjdjdjdjdndfj your second part?? yes But no it wont work
first the cold you wont die of hunger but hypothermia
@@Ilondjdjdjdjdndfj because women was in range and german guys ran away i guess
As a german, who is also a HUGE fan of this movie, i am very happy to see this film finally getting the international appreciation it rightfully deserves. This Film, together with Bernhard Wicki's "Die Brücke" (the Bridge) and Wolfgang Petersen's "Das Boot" is basically the holy trinity of german Anti-War movies, because they perfectly nail it. Making the audience getting personally involved with the faces and humans who were put into the uniforms and sent out to kill their brothers and sisters who the government told them was their enemy now.
KRAFTWERK2K6
The film is an absolute masterpiece, alongside Downfall and Cross of iron.
It's just a great pity, that the human race is so dumb, that history will keep repeating itself.
Downfall was excellent also.
How did you feel about the All Quiet on the Western Front remake?
@@jabom99 Don't worry, when Steiner attacks everything will be allright.
Actually Stalingrad, Downfall and Das Boot are in Poland very popular, iconic movies.
One of the things I noticed about the film is how civilization crumbles around them the further the conflict goes.
When we first see them in Italy its beautiful and sunny, and they're able to enjoy the surrounding area including food and drink.
Then once they reach Stalingrad and the battle commences, everything falls apart. Until it reaches a point where there's literally nothing but ice and snow. No real buildings to seek refuge in, no food, no provisions, and no people. They've been wiped out due to the harshness of war. Thus leaving these men to die in a barren land where nothing lives.
Agreed, stalingrad Reminds of a game called Frostpunk due to this, (Post apocalyptic ice age city colonly sim)
yeah, because Italy is paradise and hell is frozen
The most disturbing part of the film for me was when they found the Russian girl handcuffed to the German officer's bed. At first I was thinking, "oh, they're going to free her," but they just kept staring at her, then one told the highest ranking guy that he could go first and they left him alone with her. He ended up freeing her instead, but the moment still haunted me.
sure it all happened... in your dreams!
@@xpr3ss.755what a stupid comment of yours.
@@xpr3ss.755 loser
wehraboo detected, opinion rejected
@@xpr3ss.755 sorry shouldn't your women be getting chained to beds by arabs?
6:56 I have to add that this line hits hard not only because the dead can no longer cry, but most of the men have become so desensitized to war and death that they CANNOT cry anymore. It shows that displaying basic human emotions in a time of war seems weird but in actuality it's the majority of the soldiers that are acting strange.
I think the scene where he says be glad you can still cry wasn't about being thankful you're still alive to cry but because he's seen so much horror that he emotionally can't cry for anything or anyone anymore! The war has taken his humanity and in some ways that's much worse than death!
That's exactly what he meant in this scene.
Later when they are freezing,they mention its too cold and they cannot cry.
The worst part is that this is not just a fictional movie. This actually happened and will happen in every war after
What gives me chills, is that they refer wounded or dead comrades as "kaputt" or broken. This and the Grey uniforms, helmets, their nearly machanical fighting and the industrial portrail of the city really shows that these men are more machines than humans.
I believe that's a fairly natural reaction, to being surrounded by so much suffering and unspeakable misery. Your emotions can't handle the implications of the same happening directly to you, so you numb them to avoid going crazy with terror.
@@Typanoid Exactly.
Saw this movie on Netflix way back when Netflix mailed DVDs to your house. I was probably around 11 at the time & this movie traumatized me like no other. About 2 years ago I sought it out again and bought a copy. It's an absolute masterpiece and way more people need to see it. Easily the best film ever made about the Battle of Stalingrad.
On the crying comment from Fritz who says "you should be glad you can still cry" -it foreshadows the ending when he freezes to death holding Witzland and says "it's too cold to cry". The best ending to any war film ever.
Easily the most underrated war movie I've ever seen. Only one that shows that not every German was a Nazi. A bunch of them were normal ass dudes who were told they have to fight for their country. And millions of them died for nothing in Russia.
The whole ordeal of demonizing all WW2 Germans and Nazis and making the Nazis ALL literal psychopaths and literal monsters does major discredit to what the real evil was - human beings. Ever since the war ended they did everything they could to dehumanize them but they forget that such treatment allows such things to be repeated more easily by forgetting that ANY group around the world is capable of such things. Additionally you have to humanize them as well to understand that they weren't all the same. The majority of those dudes just wanted to go home and be with their families and be done with it (just like normal people). The post-war narrative is just absolutely disgusting.
A movie very similar to this is Das Boot. Also a German war movie which follows a German U-Boat crew through the war. Quite a gritty, nightmarish and claustrophobic movie that deserves a nightmare fuel video.
There's a movie (1981) and a series (2018)
@@UnleashTheGhouls there was an extended tv show version of the 81 movie (5h long), which is the proper way of watching this masterpiece. the 2018 is not even close to the original
you cant compare U-Boat to this direct to VHS POS. This film is only marginally better than enemy at the gates.
@@UnleashTheGhouls yes the 1981 version is a movie (i was talking about the 1985 television version which has 6 episodes a 50 min ) my bad
I own a metal cigarette case from one of the crew of that boat (it's stamped with "U-96", and the Kriegsmarine U-Boat emblem of a shark).
One of the most underrated classic war films
It's fantastic!
@@UnleashTheGhouls yes it is. Any chance of reviewing a few irish films? Maybe Wind That Shakes the Barley?
@@The_Republic_of_Ireland It'd be nice to dig into some Irish films! Thank you for the recommendations
@@UnleashTheGhouls you're welcome man, we have some gems
I'd disagree that the begining of the film presents German soldiers as unlikeable. I actually think it's the exact opposite. They're depicted just like soldiers actually behave on leave after heavy combat. Drunk, looking for women, and trying to squeeze as much out of the few days or weeks that they have knowing there's more hell in store for them in the future. If anything, it paints the picture that they're just like the rest of us. They're shown taking care of their former platoon leader even though he's been wounded and will never be the same. They're seen chasing after girls... really this is accurate of any soldiers. Young guys, who've just come through hell and now have some time to kick back and relax... I find them extremely likeable and that's the point. The writers are showing us they're not so different from us.
Being from the states I can't help but admire foreign(to me at least) movies. No Hollywood hero BS, just straight up realism, this movie pounds it home, a straight up raw perspective that ends the only way it could.
Bold (and stupid) of you to assume all foreign films are realistic.
The combat scene when the characters are sent off to the penal battalions could’ve been done a bit better (not too realistic + anachronistic tanks) but as a set piece and to show them redeeming themselves and returning to their former units/rank, it’s done well.
There’s also the whole discussion where the execution scene with the boy was exaggerated etc, but personally I could look over these because they helped get a point across and were super gripping emotionally, helping us sympathize with the main characters.
I like nitpicking inaccuracies for fun but unless they’re very common or get in the way of the movie (or even hurt it) I wholeheartedly agree, the movie generally did a good job with details (shouldn’t Rollo have his cuff for fighting in Egypt) and battle scenes, set pieces, characters and story. It came off as generally gritty and raw, showing the depravity and horrors of the eastern front and Stalingrad.
The film doesn't exaggerate at all:
The advisor to the movie, Hans-Erdmann Schönbeck who was himself a veteran of the Stalingrad encirclement said, when he was in the field hospital wounded with a punctured lung & a back injury while waiting for treatment, he got to watch people being amputated without anesthetic for hours. Conditions were even worse in the narrow perimeter on the west bank of the Volga river the Soviets bitterly clang to before the encirclement. There novice surgeon Anisim Moisenko had his undersupplied operating theatre in a small dugout. A lot of times when he had no morphine left he had to resort to injecting vodka instead. Ultimately, the scope of the fighting & suffering cannot truthfully be depicted for its sheer scale.
Never forget the battle for what it was, rougly a million people died in & around Stalingrad.
Some estimates put it at around 2.5 million
Russian losses were around 1.2 million
I always thought he was saying be glad you can still cry because of how many men might’ve gone hardened & numb from what they were experiencing.
That's also an excellent take Timothy!
The creepiest scene in the movie for me is when the soldiers find the sex slave in Haller's house and they coldly say "we'll go by rank". And when she screamed "fuck me and shoot me!" chills went down my spine.
Just for people that havent seen the movie - the Germans do not rape the women then. The officer saves her since he met her earlier and doesnt want to go down to that level.
Its still a horrifying scene on so many levels.
The soldier who’s body was blown in two dying so suddenly and abruptly really got me. Shows you that you don’t die a slow, graceful death like in the movies.
I mean if I had to choose I’d want to be instantly blown in half instead of bleeding out slowly knowing you’re going to die in a minute or two
Lol no
Getting shot in the head or getting blown to bits will kill just about anyone instantly.
Watch Ukraine videos on anywhere but RUclips. You can't imagine the reality of combat. It's both exactly what you expect and still something you can't know.
The scene is from an eyewitness account from the book "Enemy at the gates". It actually happened.
5:15 you mentioned how you wondered how many people were killed due to inaccurate weaponry which just boils down to being an accident and boy you wouldn't believe just how many deaths were due to accidents in WW2 and in pretty much every war since. Even in my own experience in war during the Iraq War in 2005 we had a quarter of our battalion's deaths being caused by accidents/negligence.
I saw this movie in the cinema in 93 when I was 13. It gave me nightmares for days and the tankscene still gives me goosebumps to this day. It's a very good movie.
Not a fun, but a fact: The tank scene really happend. At school we discussed that scene under the aspect of euthanasia to facilitate the sure death of a dying person. That was in the 90's, long before that movie. This scene has also haunted me for years.
6th Army was the greatest tragedy of the 2nd World War. Hitler basically gave their lives away. 6th Army and her allied support were encircled, butchered, then suffered the indignity of POW camps and servitude for an additional 5 or more years after the war ended. It was thought that perhaps 6 thousand survivors of Stalingrad returned to their own countries of origin. Luckily Hitler was a poor general, in the end, but not lucky if you were a soldier in one of his armies.
That scene where the plane leaves didn’t get the recognition it deserves, truly hell on earth the idea that this plane is their last chance of ever getting out of that place, and the desperation of people to get on the plane as it takes off
The part about being glad you can still cry isn't just about the dead not being able to but about soldiers who are still alive but have lost the ability to cry. Trauma can do a variety of strange things to people and one of them is to remove their ability to feel certain emotions or much of any emotions at all. Trauma can tear away a good portion of the individual's humanity.
Cross of Iron (1977) follows a similar beat but follows a squad of German soldiers during the Crimean front of 1943. It's pretty harrowing.
Still made by a country who fought the Germans. Stalingrad is by the Germans themselves.
@@nm7358 Cross of Iron is based on a book called 'The Willing Flesh' which was written by Willi Heinrich, who was German.
yes, the film was made by a largely American crew and director with American and British cast members, but it also features a lot of German actors aswell.
The country of genesis is kinda irrelevant imo. it still carries the same message as Stalingrad.
that movie took in the Kuban bridgehead on the Taman Peninsula, not on Crimea.
@@joemammon6149 My apologies, I got mixed up as I've I thought I'd heard Crimea referred to as 'Where The Iron Crosses Grow'. Appreciate the correction, thank you :)
And based on the stubborn German resistance late in 1943 to hang onto the Kuban sector.
A little historic detail is that you see some of the Germans using captured Soviet PPSH Sub-machine guns. This is because the battle in Stalingrad was so close quarters that enemy soldiers would fight room to room in a single building. This rendered single shot, bolt action rifles unpopular among some Germans, so they opted to swap them with rapid fire Soviet SMGs, and this became so common that the German army started handing out manuals on how to operate these guns, and convert them to use standard 9mm ammunition.
I thought it was more because the ppsh generally performed better than the mp40, which many Germans in the movie were using
@@teo.took.40.benadryl it was more a difference in German army doctrine
The Germans issued MP40s to Squad Leads, scouts, engineers, and Panzergrenadiers, leaving the rest of the squad with either a machine gun or rifle
The Soviets meanwhile were deploying entire squad with PPSHs as their main weapons, with one or 2 men using MGs
Any german soldier refusing orders was placed into a 'punishment battalion' mine clearing was one of their deadly duties.
The german 6th army in Stalingrad was left to its fate by Hitler even though a break through there was an attempted rescue German troops either died of starvation or froze to death possibly both.
General Friedrich Paulus was eventually forced to surrender his men against Hitlers express wishes in doing so. 90,000 german soldiers went into captivity around 5,000 came home.
RIP bozos rest in piss
Another thing of note regarding the snow battle scene.
This was before the German army was issued weapons such as the Panzerfaust and Panzershreck, which offered their troops the ability to effectively knock out enemy tanks from a certain distance.
As a result, and as seen in the battle, German infantry had to use anti-tank weapons that they had to throw towards a tank up close and personal. Molotovs, Bundle grenades, and magnetic tank grenades. All of which required the soldiers to be extremely close in order to properly disable a tank.
Which must have been utter hell to endure
The film really had an impact on me. I am so fascinated by the Eastern Front, as an American, they never taught us about this part of the war in school.
This movie is soo shocking and heartbreaking and the pianist is a nightmare movie aswell.
I very much hope to cover The Pianist as a Nightmare Fuel episode Leon!
@@UnleashTheGhouls +1 the pianist is a very good movie
The pianist was one of the only movies to have me sit locked to the screen for the entire runtime, I haven’t found a movie as heartbreaking nor could draw me in such a way
Sometimes the scariest horror movies are based on events that actually happened.
It's called "Life." And "War."
So many young men, so many names, forgotten, lost in battle. And for what? Glory?
It's downright terrifying and depressing to see.
I also must say. This video, and this analysis of this movie, you did an amazing job on.
Precisely! It's as if we refuse to own that actual PEOPLE did these things. Not monsters, not aliens, not some metaphysical devil-man Hitler, but actual PEOPLE. The double-side being that normal people also endured these horrors as those who just wanted to be done with it. It's amazing that such strenuous arguments have to be made that "Germans in WW2 were people too". But that's how brainwashed the entire world was after the war.
my grandfather was one of the german soldiers in stalingrad. i don't know terribly much about it, but i do know that frostbite made him lose his toes while on the way there, and that his head eventually got "grazed" by an artillery shrapnel, which heavily wounded him by shaving off some of his skullcap. he survived, probably thanks to that wound, as he was on one of the last planes that evacuated from stalingrad before the city got fully encircled. i never got to see that wound on his head (i only knew him wearing his hat) , but i got told that his brain remained visible.
He really was a lucky man, holy moly!
He was really lucky
Your analysis is so good, it really highlights the grim themes of this movie and exposes war for what it really is.
Thank you!
8:10 my grandfather was in Germany, and he handed a little german girl a Chocolate bar after asking her mother if it was ok, after he handed it to her, mere seconds, a mortar hit the ground very close to him, he got blown back, and after he got back up, he carried that same german girl that was killed by the mortar back to his mother , I believe he only talked about that once to my uncle
That's a really heartbreaking story Harrison 😔 - Connor
@@UnleashTheGhouls I appreciate it.
We appreciate the amount of dedication and effort you've put into all of this. Thank you for sharing your insights in this regard.
We always have an appreciation for you Sophia! You bring so much positivity to MANY channels comments! Thank you for being a true force of good!
"Be glad you can still cry" isn't a reference to the dead. It's even worse. He's saying that war has traumatized others so much that they cannot even cry about it anymore. They have lost that feeling. They have lost their humanity. At least, that's how I've always interpreted it.
One of my favorite line is when otto says "My flesh melts and seeps into my bone every night but i put myself back everytime for that none of you can kill me" Otto is an interesting character in this movie imo
I still remember seeing this movie by accident somewhere in late 1995 on TV together with my sister and we were both absolutely traumatized. I kept thinking of that movie for a few years till a friend in school back in 1998 or 99 borrowed me his VHS copy so i could watch the whole movie. It was gutwrenching but i realized how good the movie was and i was baffled by its FSK12 age rating, which means anyone the age of 12 and up can watch it.
We watched it at school once. I think we were 13 back then. In Austria and Germany that is quite normal I would say. Not to watch this exact movie, but Schindler's List, the Pianist, die Wannseekonferenz and so on. They want the kids to see and feel the horror of the ns-regime in order to make you feel guilty.
@@derKrampus Yeah they waste no time to make you feel guilty in school. We had almost a whole year of history class only WWII. So much so it was really getting annoying. because it felt like being educated by the Media. And of course we only watched "Shindler's List" and "Der Hitlerjunge Salomon". It was very one sided and never really anti-war but always only like "look what happened to the jews! Don't focus on anything else!" which i really felt like completely disregarding everything that the war did to everyone else. It's a shame because "Stalingrad" and "Die Brücke" would have deserved more to be shown. About how people are manipulated into fighting and the pointless cruelty that results in it. That would have been a much stronger message to Students instead of just getting guilt-tripped into feeling bad for being German or Austrian.
Thanks for making a video about this masterpiece.
Thank you!
Generation War is worth watching as well.
Brilliant!
This and Generation are by far my absolute favorite German WW2 movie/miniseries that I have ever seen
The way they treat death of friends, is for survival, like dark humor when something bad happens to you
This is one of my favorite movies. Glad to see you discussing it. It's one of the most bleak films I've ever seen.
This is such a good movie. Thank gods that ppl make videos about it.
It's a film that is definitely worth an episode on our channel!
Leutnant Hans Von Witzland was played by Thomas Kretschmann who also played Fegelein in Downfall Thomas Kretschmann 00:40
thank you so much for introducing me to this movie. I'm definitely gonna watch it when I got time for it!
It's on RUclips with English subtitles in full Marshall!
the crying part was completely misinterpreted it was more about that those who cant cry anymore have it worse. Meaning the people that got too used to it
This movie is awesome, i was blessed by my babushka when she bought it for me.
I think that Fritz meant that he himself had lost the ability to cry. He is obviously more experienced and more traumatized than the younger soldier
Yep
I have only seen this film once, and it is easily one of the WWII films that has stuck with me even with just that one viewing. I think the scene where I accepted all the main characters were going to die was when they missed the plane. I think they knew that too even after they found the cellar with the abundance of supplies. I felt especially bad for GeGe, and I think the characters in films like these I always relate to the most are ones like him or Blithe in Band of Brothers, even. I am a huge overthinker and there is no way I would ever get thrown into a situation like this and be able to apply Fritz's advice to just shut it all off and "not think." Unfortunately I'd probably be that soldier who got blown up in the crater. Your entire 18-20 something years of being raised, taught, trained by your parents, teachers, peers, family, etc. in the hopes of becoming a great man snuffed out in just a few seconds by an enemy you never had any hope of seeing, much less stopping.
Thank you so much for this one!
one of the few movies that shows this period and its soldiers as what it is, just young men in a situation they dont want to be in. Not everyone was a nazi, most hated the nazis and what they did. And im glad this movie gets a bit attention
Captain Musk is the type of officer German soldiers would follow through hell and back. We witness him in the beginning, keeping his cool in all circumstances and totally ruthless in his objectives. Despite having lost his left forearm being in the thick of it and leading by example. The second time with a camarady attitude, sharing his last cigar with his men after another grueling engagement, and pulling the cannon with them through the cold and snow. The third and last time being ravaged by disease, hunger and frostbite, and looking utterly sad and desillusioned. But even then his NCO Rohleder still puts his trust in him, carrying him, while he is actually dying. An excellent officer, the German counterpart of captain Miller in 'Saving private Ryan' (Rangers are Pioniere!) who died a senseless and useless death.
Stalingrad and Red Angel (1966) are my two favorite war films of all time. Both are super bleak and shows that war only produces suffering and a large pile of corpses.
German artillery doctrine in ww1/2 was that friendly infantry needs to be able to absorb 10/15% casualties from their own artillery to be able to be an effective attacking force
The Siege of Leningrad was even more nightmare fuel
The movie is really well done, the thing that shocked me the most in the end was the fact that only 6000 germans survived the russian prison. After my grandmothers husband passed away, she lived together with a man called Bruno for probably 15-25 years, I don‘t really know about their relationship but they apparently were just life partners.
Bruno passed away around 2015-2017 and what I found out a couple years later was, that he fought in Stalingrad as a german soldier, ended up in russian prison and came back home alive.
I didn‘t meet him often and was about 11-13 when he passed away but in a way it felt like he was my grandfather since I never met my real grandfather.
My father told me about his life story and that he fought in Stalingrad only about 1-2 years ago but until today I didn‘t know how few german soldiers actually made it out. He spoke russian really well so that‘s why he probably came by quite good but it‘s still so unreal to me that he was there.
He was a very wise man and always seemed very reflected about his own life. Now all his achievements seem even greater to me considering what he has seen and experienced.
It‘s now that I hoped I would‘ve been older around that time to hear his thoughts and maybe stories he is willing to share.
Great video by the way
Fritz, when saying at least you can still cry is also probably in reference to the men who are still alive, but have lost their ability to respond emotionally. "shell shock" as it was called left millions of men and probably many female nurses, and others in places where there was so much violence and loss and brutality that their brains literally STOPPED responding to what was going on around them. They just did their jobs without really thinking anymore.
The fact that almost 2 million people died in a battle for a single city and its surrounding areas is mind boggling. We really can’t even begin to visualize what that looked like or felt like. There’s not a single comparison to something on that scale.
I'm German and it's my Favorite War Movie
I still remember watching it as a 12y old together with my dad
0:07 geez, with all the casualties I thought it was like a year.
This is one of my favourite war films. It’s realistic and there’s no hero’s.
5:49 i hate to disagree with you, but that response wasn't malice, it was the man who tried to save him coping with the fact one of his friends just got exploded.
I had a relative who survived Stalingrad, made it out with one of the last flights. Apparently he never spoke about the experience.
I need to give this one another shot - I took it as a major step down from STALINGRAD DOGS DO YOU WANT TO LIVE FOREVER with a lot of CROSS OF IRON and ATTACK AND RETREAT mixed in.
Stalingrad (1993) is one of those films I can always rewatch, was also the reason why got a dragon figure collectable from this battle. (also have one from the battle of Ardennes)
It's only too bad they left the stocks folded on their MP-40s. As for friendly artillery fire, that also happened in Vietnam. It was depicted in both 'Platoon' and 'We Were Soldiers'.
I wish you did more of these war breakdowns, you have an amazing way of summing up a movie in a unique way.
Thank you! Going to continue to cover a couple more every month!
Der Hauptmann, Das Boot, the original Stalingrad (Dogs, Do you want to live forever?), Der Untergang, etc. are all masterpieces made away from the glittery and biased limelight of Hollywood.
All good choices. The Bridge (both versions) & Green Devils of Monte Cassino are worth a look too.
Wait until you get a load of Come and See.
@@timfurlong1451 I have, yes. One of the most harrowing movie experiences I've ever had. Absolutely terrifying.
@@MacheteSeason The Bridge? Can you please specify the years of release for both, or links?
@@BlutUndEhre88 Sure - there's one made in 1959 and a remake in 2008. Both are German & Subtitled so you may have to search "Die Brücke". Can't find links but if you take to the seas matey, you'll find 'em.
This movie and the depiction of this battle must feel very strange to people from the Anglosphere who are more used to movies from the Western Front or the pacific front, like Saving Private Ryan and Thin Red Line. Horrible battles, no doubt in that, but the Eastern Front was something else.
The German war against the Soviet Union was not a war that fits into the scheme of classic wars, which exists in the minds of people from the US and England-It was a war of annihilation.
The German leadership with its ideology was determined to wipe out Bolshevism and not only the Red Army, but the Soviet people itself, as they were not seen as humans, or of equal worth. And if the Germans would not succeed, the leadership (moustache guy and his buddies) was ready to sacrifice Germany and its people for it. So it was wiping the other people (not only the country and the army, but the whole ethnicity) from the face of the earth or getting wiped out by trying. Moustache guy and his buddies wanted to get "Lebensraum" for his "superior race".
The behaviour of the German soldiers in this movie was quite precise. They grew up in times of the Great Depression. Right after Germany started to get its stuff together after WWI and things started to get better, the financial crisis hit hard and from the ongoing political turmoils the moustache guy and his buddies emerged. Living standards in the rural areas were still worse than the ones in the Anglosphere. Families with up to 10 kids in the countryside were quite common to secure the family. More kids equals better chances that one kid might make something good out of his/her life. Combine that with a hierarchical society, were the the families of the aristocracy and the bourgeoisie are seen worth more in every aspect of live and you will receive cynical soldiers with a strong sense of duty. You can't compare that mindset to the invidualistic mindset of the people from the 21st century. Dying for a higher good was expected. I am pretty sure, that they felt that it sucked. But on the other hand, they can't complain, since the hierarchical structures of the society were still very much in place.
Edit:
PS: Good video. I like, that the movie finally gets some recognition.
You all have been cranking out some good ones! I bought this movie on DVD at Border's bookstore back in the day.
Thank you! It's a great one to have in the collection!
Hitler: We are going to invade Russia next
Soldiers: We are going to get winter coats right?
Hitler:...
Soldiers: We are going to get winter coats...right?
It's easier to create a much truer anti-war film when you see it from the German side. They were fighting for an evil cause, one they wasted their lives for. On the other hand, the allied soldiers were fighting evil. And from the Allied side, it's impossible to make a true anti-war film set in World War II because the war was worth the sacrifice - as terrible as it may have been.
"The old lie: Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori"...
What I like the most about Stalingrad is the fact that it neither glorifies nor demonises the German soldiers. The characters are morally negative (their approach to combat, the mocking of slave laborers, the initial treatment of the kidnapped girl by everyone but Hans), but at the same time their behaviour is explained (partially justified too) and we, as the viewer, are able to sympathise with them a little - or at least form a connection with them, until the inevitable befalls them.
I Think its a dark detail in the film is ammo and food shortages, leading the germans to use PSSH (russian sub machine guns) And no spared details or gore/grime, Triage is being performed due to medical desperation , even inaccurate artirelly and foggy days of stalingrad leading to friendly fire
That is about the roughest movie I have seen. Schindler list is raunchy as hell. Stalingrad is even rougher
Historical fiction
the video is looking brilliant, keep it going.
Thank you! Hoping to cover war-related movies more frequently on Nightmare Fuel!
I found this movie both fascinating and visceral,the combat scenes are pretty raw without sparing the senses,there’s little in the way of a respite from the horrors of the war…a stark and unforgiving reminder of what happens when man loses his humanity…..
I remember as a Kid at this Time so have really bad nightmares from this excellent Movie
My Grandfather survived Stalingrad but even on the begining of the War He knew that He and his (common) Men were only cannon fodder for the brown Nazi scum.
Very good critique of the movie, Stalingrad was an outstanding film that showed the true suffering of men, women and children of both sides.
life is horrible and we are not better than people of that age
also moment Feldman triggers his rifle is not "starting a conflict" but losing stealth which was as deadly as depicted
Movie is written by the side of the Victors so thats why we never ever see the Nazis in a positive light ever.
Probably the best film depiction of the battle of Stalingrad, I know it’s not a high bar, most film’s showing the battle are not very good, but this one is very well done.
The 2013 film of the same name had over 3 times the budget, and was garbage
My great grandpa fought in Stalingrad, but he get out before it was closed.
I think this is something that everyone should watch if they want to give themself the idea of how the real world really works. No happy end
This movie has made me cry more than once
I cried in laughter when the nazis died
@@analtubegut66 Germans- Sounds like you learned history through Hollywood.
5:00 That's a myth. German artillary was pretty accuacy. But of you are in the middle of a battle inside a city where the occupation of an area changes hourly, then it can happen that you it your own men.
I'm not sure it's even a myth, I never heard about German arty in WW2 was inaccurate. It wasn't the best of all nations involved, but it wasn't bad at all.
you forgot one of the most important scenes: almost at the end of the movie where the first 2 germans where one carried the dying squad leader went outside to face the enemy but they encounter the general/high rank officers who were not on the frontlnes and they went to surrender. felt like those german soldiers fought and died in vain and mostly betrayed
One of the best war movies ever made. Americans should learn to make war movies by watching this great masterpiece.
That film left a mark when I first watched it all those years ago.
Thomas Kretschmann had roles in both this Stalingrad movie and years later in the Russian Stalingrad movie (2013-14).
He was also the captain of the “Venture” in the 2005 King Kong
"One soldier thought that Germans will take Stalingrad in three days"
Where have i heard that before? But seriously, great video man.
Thank you Spiff!
Western MSM made it up. there was no way 40k Russian where going to storm a city of 2 million while being out numbered by a large ukro army and militia.
@@fren2327 there's it is. Took longer than i thought
@@hapotus410 Now tell me about the ghost of Kiev
@@fren2327 you deleted the comment and made another one?😂 lmao man
Also, that is the most irrelevant and retarded comment you could've poosible make
Very underrated film. One of my favorites.
We fought the wrong enemy- Patton
No we didnt- people with actual brain
"We fought the wrong enemy" - Patton. (And 21st century internet Neo-N@zis)
We commissioned the wrong general
@@analtubegut66 We fought the enemy and the enemy of that enemy became an enemy after the war.
look a nazi
This and the 5 hour (proper) version of Das Boot are brilliant. Must watch war films.
it has a 5hr cut?
@@dontatmebitches Yes there were 3 verisons of Das Boot, a 1.5 hour theatrical version, a 3.5 hour directors cut and a 6 episode TV version. The TV Version is the only one worth watching in my opinion. Excellent character building which captures the anti war theme on the story best. ( I posted a previous comment but it seems to have been deleted)
Heres a link to a brilliant doc that explains how they made this film in 1981 (in german with subtitles). ruclips.net/video/olR9l4I3xO0/видео.html
Calling it the proper version is so accurate! Hahaha fantastic film
'Hunde, wollt ihr ewig Leben' can also be recommended, concerning German made Stalingrad movies .
I feel like Stalingrad, Das Boot and Downfall are the Holy Trinity of German WWII movies.
I watched this movie at the Tyneside cinema in Newcastle with my Dad when it came out. Amazing film and happy memories.
A lovely cinema!
The one criticism I have with this film were the hard cuts to different scenes. Particularly their entry to the battle, you don’t see them crossing the Volga or something like the beach landing in Private Ryan, it just smash cuts to the middle of battle right from the debriefing. Also there were at times the smash cuts happen to different parts of one room and I easily got lost as to what part of the room we were looking at.
Oh and we never saw what happened to the Russian soldiers in the sewers after they were directed by the mother where the Germans went. I felt like there was a chase scene missing. And they never went back for the rest of the unit after the German supply drop scene. Why didn’t they bring the rest to the stocked cellar?
But apart from that, there were some beautiful shots in this film, the opening in Italy, the soldiers all pulling the cannon through the snowy wasteland, and the final shot of Fritz and the Lieutenant as the end credits roll. Very emotionally effective film.