Ballad of a Soldier (Ballada o soldate, 1959)

I once heard this described as the most human Soviet war film of all time, and although I'm not sure this is accurate, it's certainly a very human film that almost looks like it could of been made in the states, at least in terms of lighting, plot and the characters, which those resembled the early years of Hollywood. Russian is one of my majors, so anything I see in Russian I pay extra attention to so I can at least pick up a phrase here or there, also to get extra details from the storyline that may contribute to my knowledge of the country and its people, past and present. This one was directed by the now deceased Grigori Chukhrai, a fairly well known Soviet director who clearly had seen a lot of early Soviet films, specifially those by Pudovkin (who did the The Mother), and of course Eisenstein (someone I actually dislike). The opening battle sequence is similar to the Odessa steps sequence in Battleship Potemkin, at least in general lay out, and of course editing wise it is very similar. The performances here are also very reminiscent of Hollywood melodramas of the 40s and 50s, and the plot could easily be set in World War 2 with someone like Gary Cooper in the starring role. Overall it's a very different war film for the Russians, and outside of Tarkovsky's films, the film from the Soviet Union era with the least amount of Marxist or communist propaganda mixed in. I'd recommend everyone applicable check this out, as it's fairly short in run time (just under 90 minutes), and concerns fairly light subject matter.