Jean-Jaques Annaud’s 2001 film follows the events of the battle of Stalingrad and Russian sniper Vasily Zaitsev (Jude Law). Zaitsev, one of the most accurate (and most lethal) snipers in history, puts his life on the line, regularly, to ensure that Russia stands strong through World War II. The film, while sidetracked from time to time following a story of love, attempts to alter the true events of Zaitsev’s journey and make it more appealing to a traditional audience. While it can sometimes ruin a film and a story of this magnitude by making it too Hollywood, the fact that Annaud and writer, Alain Godard, chose to glorify this Russian hero is appreciated. The pivotal role that he played in protecting Russia is clearly understood throughout the course of the film and by creating a script that made this character shine was a necessary decision. The casting choices should have been great. Between Jude Law, Joseph Fiennes and Rachel Weisz (and a slew of other talented actors), the audience should have had impeccable acting performances delivered to them throughout the entire film; this was not the case for one very important reason, their accents. John and Ros Hubbard chose three British actors to portray the Russians in this film and an American to play the primary, German, antagonist. While nationality should technically play little to no role in whether or not an actor is successful, each of these four actors chose to use their own accents rather than attempt to produce accents appropriate for their characters. Their acting choices ruined the authenticity of the film and took away from the believability that these actors were who they said they were. As a whole, Vasily Zaitsev’s story was one of honor, passion and loyalty. He worked to protect the people of his country and to guarantee, to the best of his ability, that Stalingrad was retained by Russia. The secondary love story was completely unnecessary and did nothing but delay the primary story and cause the film to drag at points. Other than the main storyline, which would have been manipulated, in some ways, to draw a larger crowd and glorify the film’s hero was the only true success of the film. While it possessed passion and excitement, the failure by the actors to truly deliver and the decision by the crew to insert additional, unnecessary details ultimately caused the film to fail. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0215750/?ref_=nv_sr_1?ref_=nv_sr_1
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