(1985; Russian) Based on The Story of Khatyn by Ales Adamovich and directed by Elem Klimov (both responsible for the screenplay), this surreally beautiful and initially comic film develops into a stark contrast with its cruel, ugly subject matter of war.

Set in 1943 as Hitler's forces are devastating Byelorussia, burning 628 villages and massacring the inhabitants, a naïve child, Florya Gaishun (Alexei Kravchenko), unearths a rifle from the sand and joins the partisans, led by the courageous and charismatic Kosach.

In the company of two men (one a clownish oaf), he leaves behind his mother (ignoring her protestations) and younger twin sisters. In the partisans' camp the newcomer takes part in a group photograph with the photographer sporting a mustache like Hitler's. Standing on guard duty, Flor makes the mistake of not demanding the password when Kosach approaches, who tells the boy to shoot anyone who fails to give the password and then assigns him extra duty; but when he demands the password from a girl soon afterward, she says: "Shut up, idiot!"

As the men prepare to march off, Flor is ordered to give up his boots to an older man and remain behind with the women in reserve. Upset and ashamed, he wanders off where he encounters the same girl wearing her Sunday-best dress and crying; he joins her in weeping before they both start laughing together. At first she says her name is Lily, as in Lily of the valley, but then says she is Glasha (Olga Mironova). Foretelling Kosach's death and kissing Flor, who is upset by her words as she utters that she wants "to love … to have babies" and other gibberish.

From airplanes overhead parachutes deliver the enemy to earth: bombs explode and bullets rip through the trees, tearing away the bark (very realistic). Deafened by the blasts, Flor (on crutches to disguise the rifle hidden inside his trouser leg) flees with Glasha back to his home. Unwilling to believe what he sees, slaughtered bodies in a pile, he takes her to a bog, saying his mother and sisters must have escaped to an island there.

Back among the survivors, Flor listens to his badly burned father's last words (his first words in the film had been admonishing Flor for digging) of the Germans' atrocities. "It's all my fault," cries Flor, who then joins Rubezh and two other men, carrying an effigy of Hitler made from a skeleton from the First World War, in search of provisions.

After the other two men are killed by a land mine, Rubezh takes a farmer's cow while humiliate the man for his failure to fight. After both Rubezh and the cow are killed by gunfire (animal rights were not observed in the making of this movie), Flor says to the owner of a horse he's about to steal: "They're fighting the war, not sitting at home."

Just then as Germans appear everywhere, the man with the horse helps Flor hide his rifle in a haystack and transports the boy to his home, saying the lad can pretend to be his grandson. A body bearing the sign "I insulted a German soldier" is on display. In the village the people are rounded up and forced into a barn.

An SS officer announces to the crowded occupants: "Those without kids can come out." Flor climbs out the window and watches a girl being dragged off by her hair; no one else leaves. A soldier puts a gun to Flor's head for a photograph. The barn is set ablaze and riddled with bullets.

Left behind by the Germans, Flor recovers his rifle and rejoins the partisans who have captured several of the enemy. One man, who speaks Russian, pleads, "We're not Germans; they forced us"; an officer suddenly humble claims (through the other as interpreter) illness and a gentle nature that wouldn't hurt a fly (the soundtrack often buzzes with flies); the SS officer adamantly refuses to cower, declaring that inferior nations must be exterminated. All the anger and rage cannot undo what has been done.

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Copyright © 2009 Patrick Ivers. All rights reserved.
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