9th Company

Overall good movie definitely for mature audience

I enjoyed it and have watched it 3 times since I bought it about a month ago. I learned a great deal from it regarding the Russian (maybe Soviet) point of view. The treatment of the recruits and soldiers is in line with what I have heard throughout my own military career. In a word, it's harsh and it is normal for NCOs and sometimes Officers to physically "correct" the lower ranks (conscripts) with beatings.If you are a fan of Russian weaponry, this is your movie. It's filled with AK-47s, AK-74s, RPKs, PKMs, the list goes on. There is plenty of military action involving an attack by "The Muj" as they are called in the movie. There are other violent military encounters as well that are pretty well acted and realistically portrayed. Some scenes are quite realistic while others seem an attempt to make an excuse for the Soviet loss by showing the Mujahadin as "ghosts" who can disappear into the landscape while standig 20 yards from the Russians. Having been deployed to Afghanistan, I found the locations portrayed interesting also. The locations used in filming are convincing as Afghanistan. You need to be warned about something here though...this is not a movie you can watch with a child!!!There is a scene with and much discussion about a character named "Snow White" who is an attractive 20-something young woman known by the soldiers for "servicing" recruits that come through this boot camp. They gather with her and take turns being "serviced". The actress is nude and even the parts of the scene that don't show her completely nude are too suggestive for young eyes. During the end of this scene, she is shown completely nude and the soldiers are bowing to her in their own sort of mock worship. Frankly, I found the bits involving her and discussion of her to be degrading and they made me uncomfortable. But, honestly, that emotion was an American one. It was interesting to me to wonder what the Russian mind would be thinking at that point in the movie. All things considered, this is a movie well worth the money. I value it for entertainment and education. I recommend watching this movie in Russian with subtitles.

This is the expected but also unexpected Russian film to watch.Even though I do not have much knowledge of the typical Russian films so the reality might be varied, but when I watched this film I couldn't help but compare it with other Russian films that I watched such as "August Eighth", "Purgatory". They all have a similar theme which is to describe the cruelty of the war and the fragileness of mankind when coming to war, thus indicate the pointlessness of the war. Nonetheless, it still shocked me starting with the crash of the An-22.unexpectedly, it contained somewhat "Hollywood" elements in it. To specify, the finale battle was kinda an example of it, and, for me, disrupting the continuity of the film to make it less "perfect" in the end.But when someone pointed out that the film might be biased when comparing to same genre American films because the character did not "say" something that "the war the pointless," it is clear that they are more likely to be biased in that they are using their experiences, their values, even modern standard to judge the film that happened during the Cold War. It is especially crucial for people to have some knowledge or understanding of the culture in the film in order to make relevant comments, or it is simply culture relativism; the film does not "say" that the war is pointless doesn't mean that it is propaganda or "biased."

I felt that the 9th Company was a very good film and it portrays a none western view of the Soviet Afghan War. The film follows the service of several Soviet VDV(Airborne)troopers from their enlistment up to the end of the films final battle.The film covers events in 1987-88 which was during the final stages of the Soviet Afghan War. The first half of the movie focus on the at times very brutal training that the VDV troopers go through the instructor Warrant Officer Dygalo often resorts to brutal punishment of the men for making mistakes and the actor portraying Dygalo has an outstanding scene where he goes into a rage at the men when he learns that he will not be allowed to return to Afghanistan.Another very interesting scene is at the end of the basic training a VDV commander asks the men if any of them wish not to serve in Afghanistan that they should step forward and they will be assigned elsewhere this scene is notable as many westerners may not know that serving in Afghanistan was voluntary and every Soviet solider asked to serve there.There are several good scenes when the new troopers arrive in Afghanistan and met the much more experienced men in the unit the 9th company which they have been assigned to.The rest of the movie develops well and you see how the young fresh naive men come to see the chaos of warfare.The battle scenes are very confusing and violent and you rarely see much of the enemy for very long which does a great job keeping you on the edge of your set and feeling out of control of what is happening.The last 20 or so minutes of the film is the climatic final battle which occurs in early January 1988 and lasts almost three days.The film does take some creative license in this part and portrays the unit as having been forgotten about and not receiving any fire support until the last day.In reality the real 9th Company was not forgotten and had full fire support during the battle.Though the battle and situation shown in the film is a bit different than fact I feel that the director did this to portray the general feelings of the men who severed in the war that they where forgotten and whats worse the nation and ideas that these men where fighting for the Soviet Union no longer existed just a few short years after the Soviets left Afghanistan. Overall a very good film and beyond a doubt far better than any western film about the Soviet Afghan War such as Charlie Wilson's War which is highly idealized far more so than the 9th Company is.

this is a very good Russian war movie. IT's a bloody war movie about the Afgan war. A truly savage war of extermination. with poison gas being used and such. This battle is not about that part of it. Instead it's about a company of soldiers who must fight to survive and in every war , average soldiers who are not beasts are caught up in terrible battles. This is based on a true story and it's a good one. Afganistan is one of the most horrible places on the earth and it remains that way. Here we travel back to the 80's to the first war there in more recent times. But this film shows that even though at the time the Soviets were clearly in the wrong in everyway that decent men from Russia fought to survive the hellish war. This dvd is worth owning and watching. It has subtitles in English.

This is a must watch film for anyone interested in the Russian involvement in Afghanistan. Make sure you watch it in the original Russian with subtitles as I've also seen the dubbed version where it makes the film sound like a cheap Kung Fu flick. The story and characterisation is strong as is the depiction of the russian soldiers as much a victim of the Russian Political system as were the people of Afghanistan. It also portrays the Russians as far more insightful as to the ethnic, tribal and religious make up of Afghanistan than we give them credit for. I would also recommend reading the book Afgantsy by Rodric Braithwaite to get a full, balanced view of the Russian involvement.It's not up there with Platoon, Hamburger Hill, Full Metal Jacket but it's definitely an excellent Russian attempt to put a human face on the tragedy and suffering that the ordinary Russian soldiers faced.

This follows the predictable formula whereby raw recruits are transformed into a trained soldiers with bonds that tie men in this situation and are subsequently transferred to Afghanistan during the last days of the Soviet withdrawal. They are tasked with others of defending Height 3234 and are attacked by overwhelming force having been left behind by the retreating Russian Army. A heroic defence is mounted in what is really a futile battle as both sides seem unaware of the wider picture. The battle scenes are intense as men from both sides are killed. What I didn't understand is why the Russians did not use barbed wire to control the lie of the land and their defences in such a harsh environment war were not beefed up to prevent penetration by the enemy, nevertheless it is based on real life events and shows how war can really be hell.

This is the cinematic version of a real battle in Afghanistan just before the Soviet withdrawal. But the film starts earlier with an intake of conscripts who are trained by the traditional hard as nails NCO. Although the film shows the training and hazing as pretty tough I doubt it is anything like as tough as the reality. Once trained our chums go off to Afghanistan and fight through a number of typical actions (lots of soviet kit for tank fans) until the final battle.Much of the interaction between the soldiers reminds me of L'Enemi Intime (they even have a Christmas party) but the combat is a bit Ramboesque rather than the standards of (say) Band of Brothers. The final attacks with the human wave seem to particularly annoy many viewers.

I think my headline says everything you need to know but if you need more it has aspects of 'Full Metal Jacket' and 'Platoon' with a bit of the French 'Intimate Enemies' thrown in.In Russian with English subtitles.