When the soul is pure
And the goals are humane -
The hand crushes sharpened steel!
Everyone who is at least over 25 years old remembers this song and the film where it was the anthem - this is the film Yulia Gusmana (yes, the same one from KVN who gives C's - he is also a director) "Don't be afraid, I'm with you!" Many years passed and one day on this site I saw an announcement and a trailer second part of this film - "Don't be afraid, I'm with you - 1919"However, the year 2013, when the film was supposed to be released, came and then passed - but we never saw the film. Then there was a pre-screening of the film in Azerbaijan, it was closed and opinions were mixed - the film received several awards, but was criticized by several critics who attended this show.
But here, in 2016, when I was already desperate to look for it movies on torrents, an announcement was released on NTV. I rewatched the first part and got ready to watch the second, so I did it in order to quickly share my opinion with you. But first, a retro review of an old film.
"Don't be afraid, I'm with you!" (1981)
The action takes place at the end of the 19th century. According to the plot, two circus performers - the eternal optimist Rustam (Mukhtarbek Kantemirov) and his friend San Sanych (Lev Durov) quit the circus and go to Azerbaijan, Rustam’s homeland - his grandmother is dying and he wants to see her and accept the inheritance. San Sanych is afraid for him - the harsh customs of the Caucasus at that time forced him to fear for his friend (whose father himself fell victim to blood feud) and goes with him. There they encounter the singer Teymur (Polad Bul-Bul Ogly), who was promised a marriage to Telli, the daughter of the evil rich man Farzali-bek, for the murder of Rustm. The three heroes go through a lot of adventures.
Well, I won’t give the film any slack just because it was filmed under the Soviets or “a long time ago, when they still hadn’t forgotten how to shoot,” and I will review it seriously... But at that time they really knew how to film adventures!
The main advantage of this film is the acting - you believe everyone. The most memorable was the resilient Rustam, who calmed and inspired confidence with a kind word (thanks to Belyavsky’s voice acting) and did not disappoint with the action - hand-to-hand fights, fights with sabers and knives, horse tricks - all this was brilliantly performed by Kantemirov himself. Then comes San Sanych - although Durov, unlike his colleague, did not fight himself (understudies did this), but he compensated for this with his acting. Polad mostly sang, and sang well. The rest of the actors also played well and are memorable - Jafar (Hasanaga Turabov), Pristav (Sergei Yursky), Farzali Bek (Mirza Babaev) and Telly (Gamida Omarova) - played impeccably, each character is worth its weight in gold, even episodic ones (a man with a scythe at the crossing ). The film is imbued with the flavor of the Caucasus and will appeal to fans of similar films (Mimino, Passport).
Also a huge advantage of the film are the dialogues and the catchphrases that come out of them: "He can do something!","They won't kill you more than once","It's not my tooth, it's their tooth." and so on. In addition to them, in the film, as often happened in Soviet cinema, a teaching was inserted, in this case this - if you have power, use it only for good deeds: during the filming of the film there was a wave of popularization of martial arts, which the authorities Then they tried to control it by starting persecution in karate.
There is a lot of action in the film, at least 50% of the film, and it is staged adequately, there is little camera twitching - in places when horse chases are shown. There are, of course, overlaps - not the best editing (in comparison with the action films of Bruce Lee), which was leveled out if stuntmen and karate and taekwondo students appeared on the screen. In general, since the film is an adventure, the emphasis of the action is on stunts and chases, and NOW it would be stupid to consider this film a hand-to-hand action movie, but THEN this film was quite a popularizer of martial arts and, taking into account the emphasis on drama in Soviet cinema, had the right be called RB.
It’s quite difficult to criticize such a film - there are many amendments for those years when they still didn’t really know how to make such a film (hence the strangely stuck knives, noticeable doubles, etc.), so other aspects were condemned, in particular, not everyone liked the singing (I’m not into them including, for me the songs were to the point) both in general, reminiscent of Indian cinema (again, not everyone likes it when, at a tense moment in the plot, the characters began to sing and dance), and in particular - some consider Polad’s singing nasal - but this already their IMHO, with which I do not agree.
Hack and predictor Aviator: a simple, positive, non-sagging and kind movie without tragic twists and with a lot of humor. Recommended viewing.
"Don't be afraid, I'm with you! 1919" (2013)
The first part ends “as if with a cliffhanger” - the three of the heroes stand against an entire army of villains - this frame reminds us of the covers of beat-up games and other smaller action films, and the audience hoped that Rustam, Teymur and San Sanych would return to overcome the new villains. This will not happen soon - only in 2016, viewers of the NTV channel, and then torrenters of all stripes and volitions, were finally able to watch the long-awaited (although... as anyone depends, sequels often turn out very poorly even among the Americans, what about ours to say) the return of old heroes to the screens, especially since Yuliy Gusman will again sit in the director’s chair, and the cast is strengthened by Edgard Zapashny and Anatoly Ravikovich.
According to the plot, many years have passed - San Sanych and Rustam are already aged, the first opened his own kung fu school, the second teaches young animals horse riding. Teymur became a politician and raised three children. His eldest daughter is kidnapped by his political opponents - Teimur goes to the police, but they turn him away with laughter - and then good old friends come to the rescue. It seemed like a good story...
Well, I started watching - the film began with a retelling of the old part. Then the retelling ended and the new story itself began... Well, point by point what I saw. Actually, the best moments are the same shots from the old part. The rest is complete SHIT. A little better than Return of the Musketeers, but the essence is the same. Why?
- The scenes from the trailer are promising - Kantemirov and Durov will utter catchphrases in the style of “just please don’t kill” - but there will be almost no action with them. Well, yes, at the beginning they (or rather, their doubles) will scatter some kind of gopota in the dark with action filmed on shaking with shit editing, then Sanych will walk around with a smart look the whole film and at the very end he will jerk his hand a couple of times at the camera so that the enemies scattered by themselves from his Jedi feeds; Kantemirov will throw a slow-mo lasso from his horse and smile slyly; and that same scene from the trailer with the catchphrase does not foreshadow a fight - in the next frame the enemies are already beaten and tied up - although this could have been done with doubles, we would have understood and forgiven.
- A very weak script - the heroes will unite only after 35 minutes of the film - before that we will be forced to watch sluggish copying by new characters of old ones, even direct quoting - but even after uniting we will not see any joint action from them. It is clear that the film is also cut - how was Teymur’s daughter kidnapped? I was also surprised that after the circus was set on fire, all the old heroes stood like a pillar and did not interfere with the bandits, although in the old film they would have scattered these idiots like kittens. What do you think of the strange behavior of the bailiff, who, without explaining the reasons, sent the hero almost three letters away when he came to ask him to find his daughter?
- The acting is sympathetic. The old people are still trying to do something, but without much effort, and of the new invitees, Mikhail Efremov (but the role was idiotic) and Anatoly Ravikovich, who could have saved any film, more or less played, but in this the elderly and seriously ill actor could barely cope. The young actors who played the children of the main characters did not have enough experience - they tried, but weak direction and staging spoiled everything. Zapashny did not participate in the action - he only flexed his muscles and set the tigress on.
- The soundtrack seems to have been written with the participation of Polad Bul Bul Ogly himself, but it’s not that bad, it’s just not memorable. Many songs from the old film were covered, many remained with the same voices, there were also new songs, one of them was good.
- On the plus side, sane fights from San Sanych’s students at the end forced Teimur himself to fight and the character Wolfhound (Timur Badalbeyli), who, although the film didn’t need it, and the script was crammed in ugly (the scene with his funeral, for example), but fought well, showing a variety of techniques - but here the camera also fails.
Hack and predictor Aviator? The essence of the entire film is understood from its final credits, where the actors are relaxing and sailing on a boat - it was just Guzman who gathered the acting troupe, and celebrated some anniversary of the film, with the money left over from the grandiose drinking session, they decided to make a sequel to the film and it’s a shame that it didn’t It was possible to at least use doubles to make some semblance of an action movie. I wouldn't recommend watching this - you might ruin your mood.
Therefore, I recommend everyone to watch the old one if possible"Don't be afraid, I'm with you!" and remember with kind words the actors who left us.
Author: uranium
Especially for Fight-Films.Info
There was no need to make a sequel at all (my opinion). Firstly, the idea itself is outdated. The film was, in one way or another, dedicated to “Soviet cultural workers” who, in one way or another, embarked on the path of fighting evil (in our case, fighting bandits, ridiculing eastern landowners, accepting the ideas of an exiled engineer, etc.) The film was not alone in this niche - Shine, burn my star, National Heritage, etc. Nowadays, few people are interested in this. The actors have frankly aged, sometimes it’s even a pity to watch, and using them in a second-rate movie is not even humane. Action in this quality (fights) was not possible at all in those years, although no one talks about historical reality, but it is annoying. I've been waiting for several years to see if anyone would come up with the idea of making a film on the theme of the "Hamburg account." If the sources I met are true, then supposedly among circus wrestlers in the past and in the 18th century there was a tradition of meeting once a year in Hamburg where, without any giveaways, they would find out who was cooler, I think it would be possible to create something like “in search of adventures with To bring out the JCVD and the patriotic Russian line (however, I don’t care, I’m Ukrainian) But simply pulling films from the Soviet era by the ears, well, it seems that no one has yet succeeded (let’s look at the Crew)
It seems like they didn’t miss a beat with “Crew”...
Dmitriy,
Dmitriy,
It was possible to shoot a sequel even with the advice, 2-4 years after the first part. I think they could have come up with a couple more parts with the same guys, and the issue with the villains would have been resolved. Now it’s stupid to do such a thing - the skills have been lost.
As expected, the sequel to the cult film turned out to be a little thin, to put it mildly. I didn’t even hope for anything outstanding, they just filmed a skit.
From the first minutes I didn’t like the picture itself, it was not filmed like in the good old days (the first film was shot on Soviet Svema film) but, apparently, digitally, and this gives the effect of the seriality of what is happening.
The script, although weak, could have been pulled off even like this, but here Salamonych completely screwed himself, for such directing he should be impaled. In addition to what was written in the review (with which I completely agree), there is a complete disregard for detail and authenticity, self-repetition, etc.
Another interesting point, look at the budget, it is 10 $. Well, he’s not worth the money, look at the extras, I especially “liked” the demonstration scene, consisting of two dozen people :)))
Yes, for such money, half of the residents of Baku could be gathered into the crowd. The special effects are also not great; anyone with a decent understanding of After Effects can easily create scenes where there are oil rigs and the plane on which the heroes were flying. I am tormented by vague doubts, the main thing in this project was not the film itself, but the sharing of the allocated state money in a get-together.
gotam,
It was possible to gather enthusiasts, call smart screenwriters who were fans of the old film and make, say, about how the old heroes are forced to confront a really serious and terrible enemy - but with their own cheerful mood. And here it turned out just like a skit.
I love the old film, and didn’t know anything about the new one... It’s good that I didn’t...
Dear Uran, it would be great if you reviewed films with Alexander Inshakov. You have an excellent understanding of Russian action cinema.
DIV,
My vision is just the vision of another viewer, anyone can write the same. Inshakov is in fact a Russian Seagal, I liked his Knight's Romance at one time, I don't know if he'll come back now.
Durov is probably one of my favorite actors, so many deep roles, even his episodic roles are very bright (I really like his role in the film For Family Reasons... Small, but voluminous)... I can’t imagine what could have motivated him, and other actors (Kantimirov in the first film, in general, was always a role model for me) appear in such trash!! After all, even from the trailer it was clear that the film, well.. Like, the Bourne series or the restart of the carrier, was just an opportunity to make money on a franchise that was familiar to everyone. Sorry for such confusion. It just boiled over, as with the musketeers, as with Shurik and the Caucasian captive, as with the gentlemen of fortune... You lose faith in people - with people like the producers of such remakes, nothing is sacred. I remember the episode of South Park, where Spielberg and Lucas raped Indiana Jones... Very figuratively and very clearly reflects the current trend in cinema. Here Guzman raped both San Sanych and Rustam. I’m not even going to watch the film - it’s sacred.. With the musketeers, of course, I made a mistake.. It seems like the same director.. I bought it ((
Vantala,
There is nothing to see there - a typical "shit continuation".
I just wanted to look, but the desire was gone
Mery,
Don't do this, I'm serious.