Russian History Movies

December of 1941, Northwestern Front. A German tank column is moving towards Moscow. During a mission to stop the enemy advance, Nikolai Komlev's IL-2 is shot down. Komlev manages to crash-land his plane in a remote forest clearing. He's alive, but far from friendly territory. Ahead of him is a relentless trial of severe physical and mental endurance. After battling hunger and extreme cold, evading packs of wolves and detachments of Nazi soldiers, the wounded Komlev finally makes it back to safety. But there he faces another challenge, the most life-changing of them all.

The aftermath of a shocking explosion at the Chernobyl nuclear power station made hundreds of people sacrifice their lives to clean up the site of the catastrophe and to successfully prevent an even bigger disaster that could have turned a large part of the European continent into an uninhabitable exclusion zone. This is their story.

By the middle of the 12th century, the borders of the Mongolian Empire stretched from the Adriatic and Mediterranean Seas in the west to the southern lands of China in the east. The Mongolian army, under Khan Batu’s command, was known for its invisibility, destroying anyone who dared to challenge them. Yet, even within their central territories, some areas refused to bow to the Genghisids. Kozelsk was one of them. The Mongolian armies bypassed the high walls of this small town, considering that "the skin of the wolf was not worth the risk of encountering its teeth".However, one of the Khan’s commanders harbored a grudge against the town's citizens. Now, the people of Kozelsk must face a battle against the strongest army in the world, with no hope of victory. This is a story about people facing their death. Some try to escape, others are willing to do anything to survive, but most are prepared to protect their city from the relentless storms of the Mongolian hordes.

21-year-old Lidia Litvyak is a fighter pilot in an aviation regiment. Along with her comrades, she flies missions in the most intense sectors of the front, participating in fierce air battles and proving herself one of the most effective aces. In the regiment, she becomes involved with the pilot Alexei Solomatin. Combat victories, losses and personal torments do not change the heroine's strong character, which forever inscribes Lidia Litvyak's name in the history of aviation.

The story recounts the early life of Genghis Khan, a slave who went on to conquer half the world in the 11th century.

The Nomad is a historical epic set in 18th-century Kazakhstan. The film is a fictionalised account of the youth and coming-of-age of Ablai Khan, as he grows and fights to defend the fortress at Hazrat-e Turkestan from Dzungar invaders.

A Russian military propaganda film about the tank commander Kalashnikov, severely injured in battle in 1941. The accident leaves him incapacitated and unable to return to the front line. While recovering in the hospital, he begins creating the initial sketches of what will become one of the world’s most legendary weapons. A self-taught inventor is only 29 when he develops the now iconic assault riffle — the AK-47. Shot in occupied Crimea.

Based on Lermontov's poem of the same name, Boyar Orsha (Peter Chardynin) leaves the service of Ivan the Terrible.

In Russia, in 1907, a rich lenient husband of a loose unfaithful woman is brutally murdered. She and her two lovers are suspects, but what about the stranger she met just before the murder? With no friends left, she and the stranger bond.

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The film is based on historical events that took place in the 6th century at the junction of three great powers: The Turkish Khagan, The Byzantine Empire and The Sasanian Empire.

USSR, November, 1941. Based on the account by Vasiliy Koroteev this is the story of Panifilov's Twenty-Eight, a group of twenty-eight Red Army soldiers commanded by General Ivan Panfilov, that stopped the advance on Moscow of a column of fifty-four Nazi tanks of the 11th Panzer Division for several days. Though lightly armed they fight tirelessly and defiantly, with uncommon bravery and unwavering dedication, to protect Moscow and their Motherland.

The film depicted the revolutionary events of 1917 and included some documentary footage. The film has not survived.

It is the word "horde" that had meant, for many countries and nations, bloody raids and being under humilating contribution for centuries - a strange and scary world with its own rules and customs. To be or not to be for Rus (Ruthenia), that is the price of the one-man mission as he is departing to this world to accomplish a feat. The film tells the story of how Saint Alexius, the Metropolitan of Moscow and Wonderworker of All Russia, healed the Tatar Queen Taidula, Jani-Beg's mother, from blindness, in 1357.

In the early days of the Great Patriotic War old Kuzmich from the village of Kurakino guesses that a long war lies ahead. As the village falls under German occupation and repressions intensify, he keeps aloof, arousing suspicions. Following the execution of fellow villagers and accusations of betrayal, Kuzmich agrees to serve as a guide for the German detachment, ostensibly to get a horse and save his family. In reality, however, he is planning a sacrificial deception: through his grandson Vaska, he conveys information about the enemy's route to the Soviet troops. At the critical moment, Kuzmich leads the German mountain troopers into a trap, repeating the feat of Ivan Susanin. At the cost of his own life the old man leads the enemy to perdition, becoming a symbol of the people's resistance.

A ghost and a French marquis wander through the Winter Palace in St Petersburg, encountering scenes from many different periods of its history.

The unique view on the well-known story of Christ's death and resurrection, which we see with the eyes of brigand Barabbas who got away from death on the cross.

Year 1917. Young doctor Valentin Voyno-Yasenetskyj with his wife and four children moved to Tashkent, beset by civil war and intervention. Voyno-Yasenetskyj became head physician in the city hospital. He not only saves hundreds of patients every day, operating under the bullets of the permanent street battles, fighting for his life and life of his beloved wife, dying of TB. In the midst of persecution, he as alone with four children on the outskirts of the former empire, so he decides to become a priest. And since then, he never altered neither scalpel, nor cross, he goes with them through all their hard exiles and arduous life, treating both: body and soul.

In November, at the very beginning of the terrible winter of 1941, when the blockade ring closes around Leningrad, a group of young iceboat athletes goes out onto the thin, not yet formed ice. The mission to deliver ammunition turns into an operation to save orphans from an orphanage who were not evacuated in time. Former rivals in regatta sports must now turn into a real united team in order to survive themselves and give hope to everyone else.

Russian army recruits complete training and take their posting in late 1980s Afghanistan, where the insurgents are slowly gaining the upper hand.

A dramatization of a wedding in 16th-century Russia, between members of two prominent boyar families (based on paintings by Konstantin Makovskii): Three matchmakers first visit the family of the prospective bride, and then do the same with the prospective bridegroom's family. Later, as the time of the wedding draws near, the bride is dressed with great formality and prepared for the ceremony, as the guests get ready to celebrate the upcoming wedding.

A 20-year-old extreme sports blogger lives as if he's immortal. But he suddenly finds himself trapped in a mysterious time loop with no escape. Only a soldier who died 80 years ago can save him—but only after a young man from the future helps the soldier achieve immortality.

In 1944, a courageous group of Russian soldiers managed to escape from German captivity in a half-destroyed legendary T-34 tank. Those were the times of unforgettable bravery, fierce fighting, unbreakable love, and legendary miracles.

In the film Battle for Ukraine Andrei Konchalovsky, the famous Russian director, analyzes how Ukraine, a former part of the Soviet Empire and present big European country, struggles to escape from the close embrace of the former big brother, Russia, and not to become one of the American satellites. This extensive study lasted for almost three years. Many Ukrainian, Russian and American historians, politicians and journalists took part in this study, as well as the ex-President of Poland Aleksander Kwasniewski, the ex-President of Slovakia Rudolf Schuster, the ex-President of Georgia Eduard Shevardnadze, the seventh Secretary-General of the United Nations Kofi Annan, the ex-Prime Minister of Russia Viktor Chernomyrdin, and the businessman Boris Berezovsky.

March 1965. In the heat of the Cold War, the USA and the USSR are competing for supremacy in space. What both superpowers aim for in this race, is to be the first to have a man walk in outer space. To accomplish that, no price is too high and no risk is too great. Now it’s up to the unlikely duo of a seasoned war veteran and a hot-headed test-pilot to fulfill this mission. Two men in a tiny spaceship, without proper testing, facing the complete unknown. They were supposed to do what no man has done before—and no man imagined what would happen next.

Follows the deportation of Karachays, which took place at the end of World War II. The film's director, himself a Karachay, tried to convey the experiences of people, life and culture, considering it important to make people realize what that did to him and his people.

December 30, 1941. Vyazma ('Vyazemsky cauldron') is a small detachment of Soviet soldiers, by fatal coincidence, in an unequal battle with a special unit of the Wehrmacht. However, none of them think about giving up. Each of them was ready to sacrifice his life in order to protect his native land. None of these brave people was born a hero. The myth of the red ghost is a heroic deed without a soldier's Soviet soldier in the Great Patriotic War who instilled in the animals, deadly fear of German soldiers. In place of one of the dead hero was inserted another, and the born myth of the invincible Soviet soldier. The film 'Red Ghost' is about the hope that each soldier will have.

After months of exhausting trench warfare, most of Major Belyaev's battalion was destroyed. The area is ruled by German aces snipers. Hope for replenishment collapses when the convoy, in which the Soviet snipers were traveling, falls under a German airstrike. A handful of soldiers and a young hunter from Yakutia, Yegor Cheerin, survive.

The film tells the story of Judas and Satan wandering the world in search of a virgin who could become the mother of the new Evil.

A film about the incredible story of Karina Chikitova. In August 2014, a three-year-old girl disappeared, but she was not immediately missed: people assumed she had left with her dad, who lived in a neighboring village. Only on the third day was it revealed that her dad had not picked her up. The village searched for her for 12 days and found her alive, thanks to a faithful friend — a puppy. In honor of Karina and her dog Naida, a monument was erected at the Yakutsk airport, and a book published called "Karina. 12 Days in the Taiga." This story dramatically changed the life of a little girl from a tiny village and her family. Today she is already 12 years old and studying at a ballet school.

The story of the Podolsk cadets’ heroic stand outside Moscow in October 1941. Cadets were sent to the Ilyinsky line, fighting alongside units from the Soviet 43rd Army to hold back the German advance until reinforcements arrived. Hopelessly outnumbered, young men laid down their lives in a battle lasting almost two weeks to obstruct the far superior German forces advancing towards Moscow. Around 3,500 cadets and their commanding officers were sent to hold up the last line of defense outside Moscow. Most of them remained there for eternity.

When gold is discovered in a remote location, a variety of different groups descend on the spot to stake their claims, resulting in a spate of brutal violence.

The film covers the heroic defence of the Brest Fortress, which was attacked during the first strike of German invaders on June 22 1941. The story describes the events of the first days of the defence, including the three main resistance zones, headed by the regiment commander, Pyotr Mikhailovich Gavrilov, the commissar Efim Moiseevich Fomin and the head of the 9th frontier outpost, Andrey Mitrofanovich Kizhevatov. Many years later veteran Alexander Akimov again recalls the memories of the time, when he, then a 15 year old Sasha Akimov was deeply in love with the beautiful Anya and suddenly found himself in the middle of the bloody events of war.

WWII 1942: Rzhev, USSR. Stuck in a crucial strategical position, a small company from the Red Army does whatever it takes to fend off the Nazis.

1917, Yakutia. 9-year-old Mikita is growing up beyond his years, as he, along with adults, learns the difficult life of a Yakut cattle breeder, where every day is a struggle for survival. New challenges await the boy, as the events of the revolutionary, rebellious time violently invade the traditional way of his family, violating the values and way of life that have been established for centuries.

One of a series of short Bolshevik films, Comrade Abram focuses on Abram Hersh, a young Jewish pogrom survivor who became a factory worker and organizer in Moscow and eventually rose to leadership in the Red Army. This short film emphasizes Hersh's suffering and heroism as both worker and Jew, and promotes solidarity over anti-semitism.

Douglas is a foreign entrepreneur, who ventures to Russia in 1885 with dreams of selling a new, experimental steam-driven timber harvester in the wilds of Siberia. Jane is his assistant. On her travels, she meets two men who would change her life forever: a handsome young cadet Andrej Tolstoy with whom she shares a fondness for opera, and the powerful General Radlov who is entranced by her beauty and wants to marry her.

The film reconstructs in Berlin a scene in front of the German consulate in Moscow, using a single and continuous camera shot, with no cuts. Russian immigrants are standing and waiting to get a visa; there's a different gate for each travel reason. Help and assistance is being offered in front of the entrances. A woman walks by the waiting line and is withheld: Her bag is too big and must be handed in. She looks for a place where she can leave it.

The early Middle Ages. A time of heavy swords and dark blood law. The ruling clan is in discord. The guilt for the accidental death of the brother has fallen on the Grand Duke. According to the law, revenge must be taken by the younger brother, a bastard. For the refusal to kill, he has to pay with eve- rything he had, because “for peace you need more swords than for a war”...

About the Soviet railway workers who heroically kept watch on the fronts of the Great Patriotic War.