Victory Day

Visual power draws on director's own video and photo archives of global trouble spots as well as cinematic depiction of PTSD on a war photojournalist. For me, this film was a fresh voyeuristic experience of an American in Prague trying to emulate the Russian heroics of Pushkin and others. Not a film I forgot on my way out of the theater.

Victory Day covers a lot of territory. Sex trafficking is a key element. I saw the film in San Francisco, a trafficking hub. The Russian kleptocracy of the early 90's is the other key political element. Both of these inform and fuel the action.

I'm not giving Victory Day a 10 due to sound issues. Like many indies, the ADR quality is a little disconcerting. Also, with a large cast, line deliveries are uneven. I almost feel all of this would have been unnoticeable if the film was in Czech instead of English. Though the director/star is from America, Victory Day feels more like a European film.

I enjoyed the film very much. The actual footage showing what a photo journalist documents was amazing. The disturbing effects of violence and wars are hard to see sometimes, but necessary for the plot of the story. Most of the dialog was in English, but I thought the Russian & Chinese lines with subtitles were interesting. It seemed more realistic than the average movie these days. The action scenes kept me on the edge my my seat. Fortunately, it was not just violence for the sake of violence. The movie was about an hour and a half long, but seemed to flow quickly. I left the theater with a better understanding of what was happening in the Soviet Union in the 1990s. I hope to see more films from this talented writer/producer/director/actor, Sean Ramsay.