End of 1942, Ukraine, eastern front. The Private Lombos (Gábor Makray), a soldier loyal to his homeland, whose only desire as a freshman is to see his young wife again, serves here. However, due to an administrative error, he misses the train heading home. He thinks it can’t get any worse, but the real hell only begins. Educated young teacher, who speaks 3 languages, desperately fulfills his duty, takes up arms again, and marches on the Eastern Front. He is wounded in an attack and survives the night behind enemy lines in a pit. This is when he meets a mysterious old man (Tamás Varga), and this meeting changes everything. The old man's words shake his unbroken faith in his military family and homeland. At dawn, Russian soldiers find them, and Lombos is captured and then caught among the “tramplers”. The old man then also appears among the enemy's ranks, walks in the shadows, and tries to keep the young soldier alive at all costs with his advice.
_**Well done Hungarian WW2 flick with low-key supernatural overtones**_
On the Eastern Front during WW2, a disheartened Hungarian soldier is constantly refused furlough (Gábor Makray) and captured by the Soviets wherein he’s used as a “trampler,” a POW used to secure mined German-occupied areas for Soviet combatants; his mastery of several languages helps extend his life.
“Dear Elza!” (2014) is a Hungarian production that meshes “Enemy at the Gates” (2001) with Indie-styled filmmaking à la “Straight Into Darkness” (2004) along with spiritual underpinnings in the mold of “The Devil’s Nightmare,” aka “The Devil Walks at Midnight” (1971).
The paranormal angle is slight, so don’t let that turn you away. If you like WW2 flicks that emphasize the harsh conditions of fighting in the snowy European woods, you should appreciate this. The colorful action is superbly done and makes you feel like you’re in the midst of the combat. Man’s inhumanity to man is emphasized (and by ‘man’ I mean male and female; speaking of which, there are a few female militarists in this, which keeps things interesting).
The theme revolves around reality vs. hallucination and the moralistic tension between faith, instinct and reason. Some elements leave you scratching your head, including the ending. Meanwhile some of the editing early on is puzzling and almost derails the film, but if you don’t mind ambiguity and relentlessly downbeat, brutal war flicks, give this one a watch.
The movie runs 1 hour, 36 minutes, and was shot in Hungary.
GRADE: B
