First Squad: The Moment of Truth

Well, I saw it just a few hours ago and must admit it was good - not great, not a masterpiece, but still well made story. Although I'm not a die-hard anime fan, this one looks interesting. Storyline revolves around a battle between secret Nazi and Soviet organizations which uses supernatural powers to win the war on Eastern front. Germans summon the spirit of an evil Teutonic knight and his minons, so the Soviets try to stop them with help of The First Squad - a group of teenagers with paranormal abilities. As for me, it sounds promising. Besides, story got a nice style anyway. If you're want to see some unusual story about the WWII, you gotta see that one.

It is a true masterpiece. But not for mainstream hamburger eaters. The great story. The movie addresses history and a lot of Soviet era archetypes, as well as spiritual side of life. It makes the film interesting for any nation. A lot of people in Soviet Union was up-brought on the idea of spiritual strength of Motherland defenders and readiness to sacrifice own life defending Motherland. This makes them comparable to Japanese fighters. All of them were taught that the spirit of people is winning wars, not tanks or bombs. That's one of the ideas of the film as I see it. Though there are disputes now under way were Soviets good or bad guys in WWII, some facts are indisputable. 1) A most of German nation was brainwashed and declared themselves supermen. A lot of ideological, manipulative and even occult methods were applied to do it.

2) The Soviet people faced a prospect of slavery and holocaust from Nazis. Though Soviet government was also very aggressive and did a lot to kill and convict a lot of Soviets as well, poor soviet people had no choice but fight for the survival. The survival of Motherland (even so cruel to own citizens), people, and family, culture and history, but not personal survival only. The chance to survive was minimal, but the spirit was very strong. The own live was something many of these people were ready to sacrifice for victory. It was mass heroism, and not fanaticism. Most of them were just usual people, not samurais or specially trained professionals. The wave of the people outrage towards Nazis was tremendous. Majority of fighters (unlike modern Islam kamikaze) did not believe in Heavens and rewards after life or heroic death, they knew that there were almost no chance to stay alive, they wanted victory and were ready to pay for it. And if after death they had a chance to fight, most of them were happy to do it. So many times Nazis were about to win, but something helped Russians again and again. E.g. Nazies were stopped in the Moscow suburbs with almost no Russian troops behind them. There were some other critical moments in this war when every little thing could play a main role in human history. If either Moscow or Stalingrad were captured, or in Battle of Kursk soviets were defeated WWII could be won by Nazis, US and UK alone without Soviets would never win the war, because Soviets paid the bloodiest price for the victory over the Nazis and were decisive power. So such moments are very interesting points of the history and issues in human psychology. The moments when the border between life and death is so illusive. I think that film creators by the artistic means succeeded to give a very interesting interpretation of such moments. So the film is a great and intellectual entertainment, it is much much better then thousands of other animated works. Great job guys! Thank you!

"First Squad" (2009) is a pretty interesting anime, and if you want to get as much out of it as possible, there are a few things you need to keep in mind before watching:

First Squad doesn't try to be an accurate representation of the battles between the Soviet Union and Germany during World War II. It incorporates a lot of supernatural elements like travels to the afterlife, clairvoyance and... necromancy? Sufficiently to say, this movie takes some wild turns in order to provide an interesting spin-off on the previously named conflict.

This movie is also very graphic. There is a lot of shootings, explosions and stabbings, all including a generous amount of blood. On top of that, some imagery can be quite frightening and shocking, in particular a scene in the beginning where the protagonist sees the future of a group assembled soldiers. Sensitive watchers beware.

What makes this anime dive in terms of reviews and ratings, however, is mostly its inconsistencies. There are some loopholes that never receives a satisfying explanation or resolution, maybe partly but certainly not only because of the short run-time. Indeed, this movie never (get the time to) develop enough momentum nor emotion to hook its viewers beyond its initial 15 minutes (which are surprisingly clever and well done), and another half hour to the final runtime could have been beneficial for this purpose.

To summarize: for easy entertainment, this does fine, but don't expect much more.

My overall grade: an unsatisfied 6/10.