This well-made but heavy-handed piece of Ukrainian propaganda asks the question: what would it take to turn a peaceful hippie dropout into Rambo? The answer is the murder of his wife by Russian (or Russian-supporting) paramilitaries during a border incursion into the highly contested Donbas region of eastern Ukraine. Apparently based on a true story, the film tells the tale of. Mykola, the aforementioned pacifist who does a 180 and somehow learns how to dis- and re-assemble an AK-47 in 18 seconds. The story seems far-fetched but who knows...stranger things have happened, I suppose. If you've suffered through recent Russian agitprop such as 2013's Stalingrad, Sniper White Raven (as the title appears on screen) can serve as either a pallet-cleanser or corrective. It's nothing special but not bad.
Review of Sniper. The White Raven
