The film's plot focuses on the Nazi German occupation of Belarus, and the events as witnessed by a young Belarusian partisan teenager named Flyora, who—against his mother's wishes—joins the Belarusian resistance movement, and thereafter depicts the Nazi atrocities and human suffering inflicted upon the Eastern European region's populace. The film mixes hyper-realism with an underlying surrealism, and philosophical existentialism with poetical, psychological, political and apocalyptic themes. That co-writer, Ales Adamovich, was an author whose books were the source material for the film. He fought against the Nazis as a Partisan rebel. a b c d e Wess, Richard (22 June 2020). "9 Must-Know Facts About Come and See". Russia Beyond . Retrieved 7 July 2020. Supplements: New interview with cinematographer Roger Deakins; New interview with director Elem Klimov’s brother and frequent collaborator German Klimov; Flaming Memory, a three-film documentary series from 1975–77 by filmmaker Viktor Dashuk featuring firsthand accounts of survivors of the genocide in Belorussia during World War II; Interview from 2001 with Elem Klimov; Interviews from 2001 with actor Alexei Kravchenko and production designer Viktor Petrov; How ‘Come and See’ Was Filmed, a 1985 short film featuring interviews with Elem Klimov, Kravchenko, and writer Ales Adamovich; Theatrical rerelease trailer. Plus an illustrated insert booklet with essays by critic Mark Le Fanu and poet Valzhyna Mort. Because this WWII in Belarus, which is between Poland and Russia, it's only going to get worse. It is enough to allude to further atrocities. However, the burning structure of villagers desperately trying to escape while Nazis laugh and clap and play music absurd to the scene, futher dehumanizing their victims, is another scene seared into my mind for all time.

a b Ramsey, Nancy (28 January 2001). "FILM; They Prized Social, Not Socialist, Reality". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 23 November 2018 . Retrieved 17 July 2020.

Stilwell, Blake (26 April 2017). "This Soviet WWII movie used real bullets instead of blanks". wearethemighty.com . Retrieved 31 March 2018.

And when he had opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth beast say, "Come and see!" And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth. Release [ edit ] Original release [ edit ] Kempley, Rita (25 September 1987). " Come and See review". The Washington Post. Washington, D.C. Retrieved 7 January 2017. What exactly does one say about a film that is without a doubt, one of the greatest anti-war films of all time? Come and See was selected as the Soviet entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 58th Academy Awards, but was not accepted as a nominee. [67] AwardThe Criterion Collection presents Elem Klimov’s Come and Seeon Blu-ray in its original aspect ratio of 1.37:1 on a dual-layer disc. The 1080p/24hz high-definition encode is sourced from a new 2K restoration performed by Mosfilm and scanned from the 35mm original negative. Outside of some archival material found on previous DVDs Criterion does appear to have ported everything over from the Kino/RusCiCo discs, which included three interviews: one with director Elem Klimov (21-minutes), actor Aleksei Kravchenko (14-minutes), and production designer Viktor Petrov (8-minutes). Petrov goes into getting the film’s more documentary-like look, from sets to cotumes, while Kravchenko talks about his casting (which he fell into) and the experience of working with Klimov and filming certain scenes. Klimov’s is the more in-depth interview, the filmmaker giving a history to the project (born out of a desire to show a true representation of the war after most films had been action-adventures) that spanned about 7 years because of censors and such having issues with the subject matter (his original title, Kill Hitler, was also a no-no).

At the end of the film, the partisans walk through a winter woodland to the sound of Mozart's Lacrimosa before the camera tilts towards the sky and the ending credits appear. [24] Film critic Roger Ebert commented on this scene as follows: [28] a b c d e f g h i j Niemi, Robert (2018). "Come and See [Russian: Idi i smotri] (1985) (pp. 61-63)". 100 Great War Movies. The Real History Behind the Films. Santa Barbara, California: ABC-CLIO. ISBN 978-1-440-83386-1.

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There have been a smattering of films over the past several decades that cover the atrocities of the Holocaust with everything from the Oscar-winning Schindler's List from Steven Spielberg to the just as important Hungarian indie film Son of Saul. Even Salo: 120 Days of Sodom covered the nazi regime in Italy and most recently, Taika Waititi took an impressive approach with Jojo Rabbit. These films have spanned multiple decades and genres that try and tell part of a massive story and war that happened not too long ago across the globe. Claude Lanzmann's 10-hour documentary Shoah captured perhaps the most visceral stories from all aspects of life from that time, but it's with Soviet film director Elm Klimov's 1985 film Come And See that some of the most disturbing visuals are shown that have capsulated the Holocaust in a strikingly visual way, similar to the recent film 1917, a vision that is not soon forgotten. The original Belarusian and Russian title of the film derives from Chapter 6 of the Book of Revelation, where in the first, third, fifth, and seventh verse is written " Ідзі і глядзі" in Belarusian [29] (English: "Come and see", Greek: Ἔρχου καὶ ἴδε, Erchou kai ide [30] and " Иди и смотри" in Russian) as an invitation to look upon the destruction caused by the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. [31] [32] Chapter 6, verses 7–8 have been cited as being particularly relevant to the film: The Criterion Collection’s Blu-ray of Come and See is a new Mosfilm 2K digital restoration. The riveting cinematography matches Klimov’s unblinking, in-your-face method: his subjects often directly face the camera — us — hiding nothing. The squarish Academy aspect frame allows an even greater focus on Flyora’s tormented face. The film does have beautiful moments, and not just in the forest play between the blossoming sweethearts. Many scenes are shot in near-twilight darkness, yet are sharp and detailed. Static shots soon give away to brilliant, understated SteadiCam shots that put us in the action and make us feel than anything could happen. Menashe, Louis (2014) [2010]. Moscow Believes in Tears. Russians and Their Movies. Washington, D.C.: New Academia Publishing, LLC. pp. 95- 96. ISBN 978-0-984-58322-5. Wise, Damon (28 October 2013). "Top 10 war movies. 5. Come and See". The Guardian. London . Retrieved 4 July 2016.

As the partisans leave, Flyora notices a framed portrait of Adolf Hitler in a puddle and proceeds to shoot it numerous times. As he does so, a montage of clips from Hitler's life play in reverse, but when Hitler is shown as a baby on his mother's lap, Flyora stops shooting and cries. A title card informs: "628 Belorussian villages were destroyed, along with all their inhabitants." [10] Flyora rushes to rejoin his comrades, and they march through the birch woods as snow blankets the ground.

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a b Elem Klimov about Come and see (interview with English subtitles) . 18 June 2010 . Retrieved 20 February 2020. To prepare the 14-year-old Kravchenko for the role, Klimov called a hypnotist with autogenic training. [17] "[Kravchenko's acting] could have had a very sad ending. He could have landed in an insane asylum," Klimov said. [17] "I realized I had to inject him with content which he did not possess," "This is an age when a boy does not know what true hatred is, what true love is." "In the end, Mr. Kravchenko was able to concentrate so intensely that it seemed as if he had hypnotized himself for the role." [16] [20] Flyora is partially deafened from the explosions before the two hide in the forest to avoid the German soldiers. Flyora and Glasha travel to his village, only to find his home deserted and covered in flies. Denying that his family is dead, Flyora searches an island across a bog. As they leave his village, Glasha sees a pile of executed villagers' bodies outside a house. The two become hysterical after wading through the bog, where Glasha screams at Flyora that his family is actually dead in the village, resulting in him pushing her into the water, then immediately trying to rescue her. In 2002, Scott Tobias of The A.V. Club wrote that Klimov's "impressions are unforgettable: the screaming cacophony of a bombing run broken up by the faint sound of a Mozart fugue, a dark, arid field suddenly lit up by eerily beautiful orange flares, German troops appearing like ghosts out of the heavy morning fog. A product of the glasnost era, Come and See is far from a patriotic memorial of Russia's hard-won victory. Instead, it's a chilling reminder of that victory's terrible costs." [52] British magazine The Word wrote that " Come and See is widely regarded as the finest war film ever made, though possibly not by Great Escape fans." [53] Tim Lott wrote in 2009 that the film "makes Apocalypse Now look lightweight". [54]