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Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
Audience Rating: Unrated
Binding: DVD
EAN: 9780780025677
Format: Black & White, DVD-Video, Full Screen, Subtitled, NTSC
ISBN: 0780025679
Label: Criterion
Manufacturer: Criterion
Number Of Items: 1
Publisher: Criterion
Release Date: April 30, 2002
Running Time: 89 minutes
Sales Rank: 55968
Studio: Criterion
Theatrical Release Date: December 26, 1960
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Editorial Review:
Description:
Russian soldier Alyosha Skvortsov is granted a visit with his mother after he singlehandedly fends off two enemy tanks. As he journeys home, Alyosha encounters the devastation of his war-torn country, witnesses glimmers of hope among the people, and falls in love. With its poetic visual imagery, Grigori Chukhrai's Ballad of a Soldier is an unconventional meditation on the effects of war, and a milestone in Russian cinema.
Amazon.com:
Grigory Chukhraj's poetic odyssey of an accidental hero on a six-day pass is a sentimental journey through the ideals of the Soviet state in World War II. Vladimir Ivashov is the fresh-faced signalman whose trip from the Russian front to visit his white-haired mother becomes a series of detours as he stops to help the loyal comrades, fellow soldiers, and salt-of-the-earth civilians (as well as a few shirkers and scoundrels) he meets along the way. On a transport train he even falls in love with a pretty young stowaway, a feisty blond girl-next-door on her way to visit a wounded boyfriend. Delicately photographed and gently paced, this deliriously romantic road movie is undeniably Soviet in its celebration of patriotism and collectivism, but Chukhraj transcends politics with delightfully vivid characters and a deft mix of comedy, melodrama, and romance. --Sean Axmaker
Customer Reviews
Average Rating: 
Rating:  - Mother Love
A mother stares down a long country road, waiting for a son who will never return. This is the most hauntingly powerful, heart-rending image in this landmark film full of many memorable images.
I'm very sorry to say that it was only this week that I viewed this movie for the first time.
But perhaps it was meant to be. I have a son Alyosha's age. I am proud to say that the two are quite similar: tall, blond, handsome, kind, sensitive. In this time in the US, with Bush's war, I do think about my son going off to fight in a foreign land. I dread him going; I've urged him to enlist in one of the "alternatives" like Navy or Coast Guard. When I was his age we faced the draft for Vietnam. I was one of the lucky ones who had enough dough to go to school and thus secure deferments each year. Others went in my place, for which I do have guilt. It was not fair at all.
Knowing Bush, I am a bit surprised that the draft has not been reinstated. All of these thoughts came to me as I watched this wonderfully simple yet tremendously powerful film.
One of the tests of a great film, to me, is this: will the pictures themselves be of interest, even without sound? In Ballad of A Soldier, the images are by turns lyrical, awe-inspiring, gritty, poetic, unflinching, romantic. Director Chukrai is a true artist.
Forget the propaganda tag. It's a universal story of the tragedy of separation and loss. We aren't literally told or shown what happens to Alyosha, ... Read More
Rating: - Ballad of a Soldier
Chukhrai's intimate, small masterpiece contains a wrenching hope for life and humanity in the figure of the innocent, Alyosha, even as he traverses a homeland under siege to see his beloved mother, perhaps for the last time. The director's stark yet lyrical camerawork complement top-flight performances, notably Ivaslov in the central role and Zhanna Prokhorenko, adorable as love interest Shura. Don't miss that indelible ending sequence in this touching "Ballad".
Rating: - Honest and pure
What Norman Rockwell was to Americana, it struck me that perhaps Grigori Chukhrai seemed to be to the Soviet Union. That was my first impression of "Ballad of a Soldier". Of course, I was not entirely correct, and some cinema-crats with and air of artsy "progressivism" about them might laugh aoud at the comparison. But to a degree, the idealism projected in the film seemed to be fitting of the period if one looked at this film with a Western point of view. This was a really good film, wholesome and virtuous. Its value as a tool in the hands of Soviet propagandists is clear, but the story itself is far above mere propaganda. It is a timeless love story, and it could have been set in any nation and at almost any time. What brought it to my interest is that it happened to be set in 1943 when Germans were driving tanks all over the western Sovet Union.
The story follows a well mannered young soldier named Alyosha Skvortsov as he embarks on a mission of devotion to his mother. During the only combat scene, immediately after the narrator sets up the ballad, Alyosha manages to perform an act of bravery that earns him a six day leave. What would any good boy do with six days leave? He'd go home to fix his mother's leaky roof, right? Of course! Alyosha sets off only to be delayed by his good nature, kindheartedness, and the rather heartbreaking fact that he falls in love with a young fellow traveller. The story is quite absorbing, simple as it may be, and I found it comfortably paced and beautifully ... Read More
Rating: - Ballad of a good soldier, friend, and son
Ballad of a Soldier is sometimes dismissed as overtly patriotic Soviet propaganda, and it's not too difficult to understand why. However, to dismiss the film as a whole and all that's good with it would be like throwing your beloved babooshka out onto the Siberian permafrost with her mineral oil bathwater.
Aloysha, the main character and soldier in question, chooses family and friendship over self-recognition, commitment despite personal setbacks, and ultimately country over all else. The film itself is a lesson in the virtues of altruism.
This really is a warm-hearted and gentle film with a heart as big as Lake Baikal is deep. Ballad is definitely G-rated and would make for good classroom and family discussion. Highly recommended.
Rating: - Ballad Of a Soldier
This is a movie classic. The theme is so universal. There is no preaching in this movie but the massage is clear. People are basically the same- no matter what color, race or nationality they belong. The DVD print is OK. The story is a tear jerker.
M.Rahman
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