Reviews

I don't understand why Mikhalkov's own people are being so unfair with this "celovekh". They want to smash not only his fingers but also his lifetime work which is impossible.

This final chapter is brilliant. All the pieces are put together by a master painter. The light in the dacha contrasting with the light in the same "dacha" from the first movie, the torment suffered by the characters, the joy and the sadness of the people touched or mutilated by the war and finally the immense Russian light blue sky...all contribute to an amazing picture.

I don't judge this movie historically even if I have read over a hundred books about the terrible war on the Eastern Front. I love the very soul of this movie. Mikhalkov does not created another sequel, he managed to create another movie which cannot be measured in IMDb stars...

So ignore the rating and enjoy the ride...on the back of Kotov's horse.

I have to admit I'm a big fan of Mikhalkov's movies as I've seen over 90% of those. A few months ago while reading the previous reviews and especially those 1-star ratings I just couldn't understand. I wasn't able to buy the sequel but I was so intrigued...Such a sensitive, fantastic director can really turn into a trash-maker overnight? I found the answer a month ago after buying the DVD. No, Mikhalkov is not a worse director now! I won't discuss the political context of his recent life, I'm interested only in his movies. Burnt by the Sun 2 is a powerful one, full of Mikhalkov's(read Russian) joy, melancholy and wonderful hyperbola. I agree this is a more commercial movie than the previous Burnt by the Sun but it still has a great soul. And those "historical inadvertences" claimed by some readers can be solved very easy. I'm a WWII scholar with hundreds of books under my belt. Yes, the shtraf batallions didn't exist back in 1941 but during the same summer the Germans entering USSR were encountering what they referred to as Black Divisions. Who were they? They were convicts released from Gulag or from other prisons together with convicted captains, colonels or generals as part of the Second Strategic Echelon of the Red Army. Anyway, watch Burnt by the Sun 2... you'll discover at least one epic scene, a landmark of war genre movies! The watch is ticking :)