Marketic It's no definitive masterpiece but it's damn close.

SoftInloveRox Horrible, fascist and poorly acted

Afouotos Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

Paynbob It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

richard6 Where do I start for the review of Attack On Leningrad! Firstly, as the title identifies, the former Soviet city of Leningrad is the focus, the attack is the German air and land forces during their summer offensive in 1941. For reason of ideology, The German leader, Hitler, wanted to raise this city to the ground. Opposing this attack, the Soviets wanted to prevent the city that renders the name of the Russian revolutionary leader falling into German hands and contingent destruction. During this attack and eventual besiege, the inhabitants of Leningrad suffered 900 days of the most harrowing experiences any group of people suffered during those already horrifying years of violence and brutality. Uniquely, the directors injects a story involving foreign, British, news correspondences reporting from inside this city befitting hell, a young Soviet female police officer, a young family and various army officers, both soviet and German, members of the NKVD and inhabitants of Leningrad. Also, half way through the film their is a tense plot twist.On paper this film appears a nerves strain of cinematic representation. If the director's ambitious vision had matched this cinematic ability, it could have been an epic film worthy of a higher rating. Instead, Attack on Leningrad is tedious and choppy. It jumps from one plot point to another without returning to resolve the storyline. About half way through, we discover that news correspondent Kate was raised in England yet born in Russia, and her father was a White Russian General during the revolution. This is not a good thing for Kate to be in the midst of the desperate Red Russians and their murderous regime now fighting to save their Motherland. Yet, this arousing plot twist is unsuspectingly left unevaluated, resulting in a incoherent film failing to fulfil an interesting and enumerating subject. Even though there are scenes well handled and diligently display the suffering of the cities population. Yet, overall there are too many emotionally flats and poorly constructed moments throughout the film. The result is a promising plot and creaky enterprise finally collapsing into a smoking heap.

Lee Eisenberg One of the stories of WWII that has always deserved a lot more attention than it has usually gotten is the Siege of Leningrad. The Nazis blockaded the city, cutting it off from the outside world for over two years. Over a million Leningraders perished, mainly due to starvation. Aleksandr Buravsky's "Attack on Leningrad" is set amid this atrocity. It focuses on an English journalist (Mira Sorvino) caught in the city when the Nazis blockade it, although the main focus is her relationships with people in an apartment building as they all struggle to survive.A previous review criticized the movie for concentrating more on the journalist than on the horror that the city experienced. Maybe that's true, but I still thought that it was a good movie. Obviously it can't accurately depict the tragedy that Leningrad suffered, but it does still look at this important part of history. At least that's my interpretation.

davidcartiersr2003 What a disappointment .... This SHOULD have been a great film, with such a topic, it should have been a great epic. Instead , we get a rather formulaic and simple minded romance story, so devoid of feeling for the historical complexity of this vast tragedy, that it comes across as an insult to the memory of all those millions who suffered and died here. The story of a stranded British war correspondent (Sorvino) and her lover (Byrne), which apparently is based on true events, would have worked as a subtext; a sideline to the larger human events transpiring, but, Hollywood-style, it takes front and centre, while the Russian People are largely relegated to roles as stereotyped KGB bad guys or masses of faceless ragamuffins dragging coffin-laden sledges along windy alleyways. None of the great players are fleshed out in this mess ... Zhdanov, whose heroic efforts saved so many, is shown only in passing, while Stalin, whose bad decisions led to the siege of Leningrad, is not even mentioned.Sorvino, who, even when looking withered and starved, still has the cutest smiles in film history, tries desperately to bring some life to this, but is defeated by her desperate attempt to affect a British accent, amid the generally poor direction. The other big-name actors don't even try, as they are handed only bit parts.After this, and "The Barber of Siberia", I'm coming to the conclusion that any Russian film with western actors should be avoided like the plague. A Pity. If you want to see a great Russian film about WW2, see Tarkovski's early film, "The Childhood of Ivan", or Elem Klimov's "Come and See". If you want to know something about the siege of Leningrad read Harrison Salisbury's harrowing epic, "The 900 Days". The movie's not a total bomb, It may be worth watching if you're a Russian film buff like myself, or might be enjoyable, if you know nothing about the siege of Leningrad ... It's just an immense disappointment, compared to what it should have been.

allenrogerj A very bad film, an amalgam of clichés and historical inaccuracies. A few examples: in an early scene Soviet infantry are attacked by the Germans; instead of staying in their trenches to shoot at them, they advance into open ground to fight them,contrary to all infantry tactics; Kate, one of the central characters, is supposedly the daughter of a White Russian and obsessed with her Russianness, yet she does not speak Russian; a guilt-stricken German airman attacks an anti-aircraft gun- the gun, however, does not fire shrapnel shells but scores a direct hit on his 'plane, which doesn't look much like a German 'plane of WWII. In fairness, when they could escape the preposterous plot and the consequent absurdities there are some genuinely powerful moments- the depiction of people slowly starving to death is convincingly done and moving, but these only show up the rest of it even more. A film to be avoided.