Ballad of a Soldier (1959)

Recommended

Soviet Union

Feature Film

Original Title: Баллада о солдате

Director: Grigori Chukhrai

Writers: Grigori Chukhrai, Valentin Ezhov

Cinematographers: Vladimir Nikolayev, Era Savelyeva

Composer: Mikhail Ziv

Cast: Vladimir Ivashov, Zhanna Prokhorenko, Antonina Maksimova

Chukhrai’s episodic, Second World War film - depicting the bitter-sweet encounters of a 19-year-old war hero, using his well-earned leave to travel home to see his mother - is a desperately uneven affair; at times, with its engaging mix of ethereally beautiful photography, charmingly naturalistic performances, and very human plotting, it is quite wonderful, but the less said about the horrible and horribly sentimental score and the wince-inducing cheesiness of the final ten minutes, the better. Iain.Stott