I did a quick review of this one. Not knowing Russian and not at all interested in trying to read subtitles too small for this 9 inch screen (on a netbook subbing for my gigantic IMAC whichis out for repairs)~ I had to limit my understanding to history (which can be read elsewhere) and my knowledge of the Great Russian ethnic group.
They have made an art of perseverence. This is one story of that trait. Followed closely a viewer should be able to come to grips with what that means. Almost like reading all of the serious Russian language literature for the last 100 years ~ you get it all here in one little piece of a gigantic war.
Not that these guys had much choice, but you see philosophical and spiritual ancestors of the young men you saw flying helicopter loads of concrete over the open reactor core of Chernobyl.
Of course the story has been romanticized and turned into a legend. I am certain the real situation was far worse, more hopeless, and certainly extended way beyond normal standards of brutality ~ but that's always hard to portray.
Liberation (1971) - Focuses mainly on the Battle of Kursk is another great war movie.
“Of course the story has been romanticized and turned into a legend.”
CORRECTION: Romanticized, SANITIZED, and turned into a legend.
The Russians were occupiers in Brest at that time, and the Brest East Fortress was a center of NKVD Border troops committing atrocities against the Poles, and even other Soviet Units, as Stalin’s enforcers.