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Lack of good storyline.

Fresh and Exciting

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

I am deadly sure that thirty or forty years ago, this film would have looked the same; and I don't speak here of the special effects. OK, I agree that the Varsovie battle that took place in those years - 1918 - was not very known of the western audiences, but I know that the movies made in the fifties or sixties in Poland did not look like this one. There were more drama lines in them and most of all not those f...happy endings destined for silly and squeamish audiences. We unfortunately find the same problem with Russian, Korean and other countries films, especially war films, maybe not dramas or crimes, which remain very specific to the genuine culture and traditions. But concerning war movies, all look like American ones, and mostly since the PRIVATE RYAN era. Meaning the most realistic scenes battles. Forget it, or only for the historical point of view which may be rather accurate. At least I hope...

The words in my review's title are the reference to the romantic poem 'The Two Giants' by the well-known Russian poet Lermontov; and as for the poem, it (just normally for any major creative works) may be interpreted as loosely as one likes. Experts in literature, however, believe this poem of the two giants fighting is in fact about Napoleonic invasion of Russia in 1812, as the same poet later, on the same topic, the Battle of Borodino, released the masterpiece 'But tell me, uncle, why our men let Moscow burn, yet fought again to drive the French away? ' The two giants' hand-to-hand fight, a metaphorical description of persistent struggle of the powers for a land where simple people live meekly awaiting who wins and thus whom to submit, is literally true either in the centuries-old drama of feud between Russia and Poland…This Polish film is certainly 'throwing stones at our Russian window'. If the events described in it were not that temporally distant, those would be not even 'stones' but 'swell cobble-stones'. As a major defeat, sustained by the Red Army, is shown here while the Red Army is still considered to be invincible in stereotyped social view of Russia. But alas, those Russians as well, to whom history is not alien, do know that catastrophic defeats causing bitterness of forfeit in terms of land and, on a large scale, of influence, were sustained by us more than once; moreover, many splendid victories of Russia were canceled out before we could reap their fruits. This was like nobody's business vividly in evidence as concerns confrontation with Poles who still name their country 'Rzeczpospolita' which sounds magniloquent for slavophones. The phrase 'with varied success' ideally fits here like nobody's business! Some people even believe that Russians simply misappropriated the right of bearing the name 'Russians', as historically, where now major Russian cities are situated, no Slavs at all used to be; there were Finno-Ugrs who used to live there; also, centuries-old experiences as a Turkic-Mongolian tributaries (those guys from the Golden Horde often acted with fire and sword) was likely to have left our nation marked for life… How many words in Russian are heavily Turkic! How many geographical names in the seemingly 'hail-fellow-well-met' Russian backwoods are heavily Finno-Ugric! And as for the territories just a bit westwards of the Russian cities of Tver and Bryansk (i.e. what is now Belarus, Poland, the Baltic states and the Ukraine) a powerful Slav-led kingdom used to be not so long ago, and its population minded very much Muscovy's bold push for (laying a claim to) the Third Rome standing (became cheeky, huh?!)! Thus, some haters say, there is no word for it! Muscovites have the nerve to boast their 'Russianity', while the Ukraine people, and Poles, and Belarusians, and Lithuanians have to content themselves with supporting roles of 'quasi' nations, which had the very opportunity to appear just by chance of epic fails of the said Muscovites; and the latter ones would get enthusiastic about some dubious, spouting blood, idea (Tsarism, Sovietism, Yeltsinism, specify) and tend to infect half the world with it – at that, the aforesaid Poles & Co. would be likely to suffer most of all… Hard to say, whether this is true, but in the end, never mind what used to be, what we eventually have here – that matters; he laughs best who laughs last. But there is neither 'last' victory, nor 'last' revolution, nor 'last' reform: as there is no last number on number line. Please not again! keep hoping... But Slavs are again killing Slavs for for the right of bearing the title of the Power… History repeats itself, history continues… It is unclear yet if the Polish and the Finnish experience would be useful for the Ukraine... What one should show in a film telling of one of the most severe cants of the wheel of history? when it is being defined, regarding this or that country, whether to be or not to be; regarding this or that truth, is it going to win or to be defeated? (Each country either by armed force or, less likely, in specie settles the bill of its sovereignty; truth has always fallen upon truth as even our ape-like ancestors would fall upon each other, holding cudgels, whooping each one's own deity's – or one's own chief's – name). One should show heroic upsurge of the nation which was determined to, ad rem, not just yell scurrilous things (especially, outraging national leaders of the state one hates), but also combat to the death etc. And the Poles have managed to show this: even the blockheads who would always be boozing in inns became, in actual fact of the war, capable signalmen and cipher officers who tried their best to service their motherland while simple soldiers were working wonders on the Vistila beating back the Red Army, which was at the gates of Warsaw, just going to seize it… One should show the combat itself: bloody, tremendous, plausible. And it is shown like this! Trenches heaped up with the killed and the wounded whose bodies are trampled on by the alive, hurling themselves at the enemy to fight hand-to hand... Violence in action and in a lull... Soldiers' sweat, and blood, and abuse... What a moment when a Red Army soldier is caught red-handed, raping a civilian woman! The 'red' commander indulgently offers him to marry her – or to be shot and killed! What the soldier answers and what happens next, is so special…In all fairness I must say, the Poles are not that poor wretch. Time and again, certain Polish hawkish circles would goad this honourable Slavic power into reckless wars where the Poles, not reckoning with domestic casualties and, all the more, giving their enemies no quarter, would try their best to, if not defeating, do them maximum harm, spoil all their plans

China and Poland, both are not strange to the Soviet of Russia, but the differences on film-art to the similar experiences are very distinct. The Polish film of 2011, Battle of Warsaw 1920, is better than all Chinese films on the same subject of war. Mr. Hoffman is an eminent film-director.Bolshevik(Social Democratic Party) of Russia, after seizing power through "October Revolution of 1917" by lie and instigation, made peace with the Central Powers at March of 1918 by expense of very huge nation-interest, then concentrated robbery and slaughter within Russia, and quickly launched war against other nations in the name of "liberate the people of the world". The Polish-Soviet war took place between February of 1919 and March of 1921, eventually ended with defeat of the Soviet-Russia. The Battle of Warsaw was took place at August of 1920, which is the historical background of this film.The film has a main storyline about invasion and anti-invasion, besides, there is another sub-line, which is the love story of Jan Krynicki and Ola Raniewska, but that's not like what some people imagine. Jan Krynicki is an officer of Polish army who had some illusion to the propaganda of Bolshevik, after experiencing a life with an officer of Cheka, Jan said to him, "you've cured me." This sub-line is very necessary, which, appears to me, is just where Hoffman's more excellent than others ordinary. Soviet-Russia claimed its invasion is not an invasion but to liberate the proletarian from capitalist of another nation, to give them freedom, how great these saviors! But it's not true, on the contrary, communist-tyranny is the most evil and most skillful institution in the human history so far. In the beginning, the communists instigated the lower class to destroy the higher class in one society, which not only the main property owners but also naturally those who holding knowledge and wisdom came from; they mocked all true honor and virtue, then labeled all mean human nature as merit. The maintenance of communist-tyranny is not a myth, it just only declared that the right of property is a shameful and corrupt matter, because they always can find some instances. After stimulating the passion of envy and revenge of the slaves(proletarian), communism must evoke strong response, and let those who dare to think the proper property institutions overwhelmed by the stupid crowd-sea. In the process of human freedom supported by aristocracy superseded by that supported by the lawyer-class is there a large gulf. The communism advocators well know that the intellectuals would become whores as long as cleaning out the base on which they live, they have no choice but only to flatter the tyrants or amuse the popular; and when few of them are aware of this shameful position one day, who would realize the worldly base on which the righteousness depends has already been dismantled. By that time, the whole society has fallen into the deep mud-pit, suffering the mischief of despotism without end, and can hardly find a way out of this disaster.

I just learned of this movie through some Polish-American newspaper for the Detroit area. I loved "With Fire and Sword" and from the looks of the trailer, that one should be even better. I can understand the previous review feeling the film is lackluster, as I have felt the same about many movies on the American Civil War, and I am a big US history fanatic and also do CW reenacting as a hobby, with which I have participated as an extra in many films and documentaries.This part of history (Europe between WWI and WWII) is pretty much ignored by history buffs in the US. A few of us in the Detroit area take a lot of interest in this particular historical segment, as not only are there many Polish-Americans in the region, but Detroit had sent a large contingent of its young men to fight the Bolsheviks at that time in and around Archangel. They were known as the Polar Bear Division, and are still remembered by some of us here.As the film has been "officially" out for a few months now, I am wondering if it has made it to the US yet. I see no website dedicated to the film, and internet searches only pull up YouTube trailers. I can only hope that it gets some due recognition here.