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Romance hits all wrong notes amid flying bullets

Review: 'Enemy' gets war right, characters wrong

Romance hits all wrong notes amid flying bullets

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Introduction to warfare

Haphazard sketches

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(CNN) -- "Enemy at the Gates" is an elaborate, character-driven World War II epic that gets the war right, but pretty much fumbles the characters.

The story takes place during the Battle of Stalingrad, a theater of unspeakable carnage that left thousands of German and Russian soldiers dead from bullets, bombs, freezing cold, and starvation. Writer-director Jean-Jacques Annaud orchestrates a couple of ambitious confrontations that will undoubtedly be compared to the staggering battle scenes in Steven Spielberg's "Saving Private Ryan" (1998). Unfortunately, Annaud's technical virtuosity far outweighs his ability to draw pathos from the brutality.

Meanwhile, the story suffers from a romance that seems more than a little bit out of place, given that the lovers are continually covered in mud and praying that they won't be shot dead. Annaud, who co-wrote the script with Alain Godard, based his screenplay on a true story, but you have to figure that he took more than a little bit of poetic license with the facts.

Introduction to warfare

Jude Law plays Vassili Zaitsev, a quiet soldier who quickly becomes the most feared sniper in the Russian Army. Vassili's introduction to warfare is one of the opening scenes, and it's a high point that the rest of the movie can't live up to: Scores of raw recruits climb out of jam-packed boats while dense enemy fire sends flesh and blood flying, and dead bodies lie everywhere.

The Russians, running out of weapons, fight in pairs. As one person gets killed, his partner is supposed to pick up his rifle and start firing.

At first, Vassili runs helplessly behind one shooter, holding a handful of ammunition and dodging bullets. When the Germans start winning the skirmish, he's forced to play dead among a pile of his departed comrades -- among whom he finds a Soviet political officer named Danilov (Joseph Fiennes), who's also playing possum. Danilov, a not particularly able shot, hands off his rifle to Vassili, who proceeds to pick off several unsuspecting Germans with pinpoint shots to the head.

Danilov recognizes the propagandistic potential of Vassili's skills. He approaches his commander, Nikita Khrushchev (Bob Hoskins ... and, yes, he's that Nikita Khrushchev), about playing up Vassili's accomplishments in the newspapers. The somewhat trumped-up press turns Vassili into a poster boy for Russian resistance.

The Nazis recognize that they have to get rid of him, so they bring in a sharpshooter of their own, an elegant warrior named Major Konig (Ed Harris). From that point on out, Annaud tries, rather ineffectively, to convert one of the bloodiest battles of the 20th century into a series of confrontations between two obsessed men.

Haphazard sketches

Still, if he had stopped there, this would have been a solid, visually arresting action movie. But Rachel Weisz is also on hand, as Tania, a beautiful Russian foot soldier.

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Vassili notices her on the transport train on the way to Stalingrad, and he glances at her like a shy sixth grader. Later, Rachel becomes a point of interest for both Vassili and Danilov. Weisz -- who's apparently wearing government-issued lipstick -- looks pretty spectacular for a grunt. A love triangle of sorts quickly develops, one that's difficult to accept in this particular environment.

Almost all of the characters are sketched haphazardly. Law is an amazingly handsome guy, and a terrific actor. His intensity is altogether appropriate, and Annaud is smart enough to allow Vassili moments of quiet reflection.

Fiennes and Weisz, on the other hand, appear and disappear at odd times. It seems as if some of their scenes were cut out of the picture. Their relationship is handled carelessly, especially once the snipers start stalking each other.

That said, Harris suffers the most. Konig is mysterious, but the script never reveals any keys to the mystery. There's no sense of his political leanings, or even his moral position on war. Konig is given zero chance to express himself, beyond blowing people's heads off from 150 yards away. That makes him more of a weapon than a man, and the movie ultimately suffers for it.

"Enemy at the Gates" is exceptionally bloody, which makes perfect sense. You see severed limbs, gaping wounds, and at least 10 different people getting shot in the head. There's also an unlikely sex scene between Weisz and Law that takes place next to a bunch of wounded soldiers. The way they go at it, you'd think the rumble of artillery was the next best thing to Frank Sinatra. Rated R. 130 minutes.



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