Come and See (The Criterion Collection) [Blu-ray]

Few artists are Masters like Shakespeare, most everything they make becomes a classic, but also few are like Miguel de Cervantes, a creator of a single piece of art that is on par with Masters like Shakespeare, sure, it's only one, but one is enough for eternity, and forever is a long time. The Soviet director Andrei Tarkovsky may be the Shakespeare of Soviet cinema, but Klimov is their Cervantes, and their ain't nothing to be ashamed of in that.Come And See is a thing of beauty, a thing of terror, a thing unique. The film stands as an unnerving nightmare of human cruelty at its apex, a sad and angering film, a movie that makes the slogan "never again" have weight and meaning. Many films on the holocaust or second world war fail to hurt the viewer in the way they should, battering you like a violent blow, Come And See does not do this, Klimov takes his time, he slowly builds and builds his horror show, in many ways the film uses horror film tropes, but not in the same way. Klimov mounts a dread that continues for such a long period of time that, even when you think the tension is being relieved, or should be relieved, you find it stays, it stays and stays and stays, until finally, in the last twenty or so minutes, it releases, not in some explosive finale, but in a draw out expulsion of bile and viciousness; the very release of tension itself is an unpleasant process, it gnaws and claws at the viewer, makes you beg it to cease, and when it finally does, all that's left, is an empty sorrow. Klimov, in the making of this film, seems, like some sort of dark magician, slowly performing a ritual, whose end goal is, for just a second, to peel back the curtain of time, and though he cannot show you what happened, he can, at the very least, let you hear Hitler's victims screams; and damn does he not get close enough.Upon seeing this film, any artist will envy its craft, as any person will feel repelled from its cruelty. It is an uncompromising vision, bold in its artistry, and hard to watch; all at the same time. Though it may have been Klimov's final film, their is no shame in going out on such a high note, hell, I don't even blame him; if I'd been as lucky as he, to make such a magnum opus, how could I resist. It is, as it's title suggests, a film to be seen.

Come and See is a classic Russian war film that is frankly unlike nearly any other in the genre, for the simple effective waybit stripsneven the glimmers of glory out of war, and highlights the horror and terrors of it.The movie sticks you behind the terrified, tear-filled eyes of Florya, a Belarusian child partisan whose dreams of defending the motherland from the Germans quickly gets tossed aside in favor of a battle to survive. His struggle is otherworldly, apocalyptic in scope... and watching it break him breaks your heart.It's one of the hardest movies I have ever watched... but few others I recommend more heartily as required viewing.It makes it easier that Critereon pulled out all the stops on the home release, as they do. The commentary and background material alone helps add some needed behind-the-scenes details for any Westerners unfamiliar with what even to this day, is perhaps the Soviet Union's finest film.

This film is everything it’s advocates claim it is; a harrowing waking nightmare of unavoidable violence & tragedy experienced by a teenaged boy. What’s amazing is the lack of gore-splashed special effects that dominate today’s war films... even the real machine-gunning of a live cow(that was terminally sick) isn’t as disturbing as the simulated killing of horses shown in Band Of Brothers. It is genuinely difficult to watch the scene in which civilians are forced into a church which is then set ablaze & grenades thrown through the windows. No gore, no flaming people, yet the horror of it is overwhelming. A young boy climbs out a high window only to be seized by a laughing German soldier & slung bodily, doll-like, back thru the window into the screaming inferno inside. Full frontal closeups of actor’s faces responding to various calamities are a trademark of horror films. It’s a hybrid horror/war film like no other.

Insanely good

A tragic story of historical reality.

The life of a young soul in the fight against the evil republicans, oh, sorry, Nazi's with their fellow Russians lending a helping hand. So much carnage at such a your age. The blank stares, the ruthlessness of the Nazi's, abusing, killing, raping and every evil deed you can imagine in a war that will never be forgotten!!!This film will bring to the individual who was too young to "be there" a story that will make you want to do everything in your power to stop war at any cost. The military industrial machine can stand this, then what does that say about them and those who are bought in Washington to support the purchase of extremely over priced killing devices. If you don't like my position, then what does that say about you????!!!! God bless our men/women in uniform. Unfortunately, it will always be there if there are military warfare devices to be sold and millions to be made.

This is the best price I could find this collection. Had everything I was looking for. Shipped quickly.

This movie is increadible. It is a little slow in tge beginning but when it gets going it's a crazy, horrific ride. Would recommend if your sick of the same garbage that Hollywood makes today.