Enemy at the Gates (2001)

Director:

Jean-Jacques Annaud

Writers (WGA):

Jean-Jacques Annaud (written by) &
Alain Godard (written by)

Release Date:

16 March 2001 (USA)

Genre:

Drama | History | Thriller | War

Tagline:

Some Men Are Born To Be Heroes.

Plot:

Two Russian and German snipers play a game of cat-and-mouse during the Battle of Stalingrad.

Plot Keywords:

Russian | Sniper | Stalingrad | WWII | Rifle

Awards:

6 nominations

Cast

Jude Law	...	Vassili Zaitsev
Ed Harris	...	Major König
Rachel Weisz	...	Tania Chernova
Joseph Fiennes	...	Commisar Danilov
Bob Hoskins	...	Nikita Khrushchev
Ron Perlman	...	Koulikov
Eva Mattes	...	Mother Filipov
Gabriel Thomson	...	Sacha Filipov (as Gabriel Marshall-Thomson)
Matthias Habich	...	General Paulus
Sophie Rois	...	Ludmilla
Ivan Shvedoff	...	Volodya
Mario Bandi	...	Anton
Hans Martin Stier	...	Red Army General
Clemens Schick	...	German NCO (as Clemans Schick)
Mikhail Matveyev	...	Grandfather (as Mikhail Matveev)

Also Known As:

Duell - Enemy at the Gates (Germany)

MPAA:

Rated R for strong graphic war violence and some sexuality.

Runtime:

131 min

Country:

USA | Germany | UK | Ireland

Language:

English | German | Russian

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

DTS | Dolby Digital

Certification:

USA:R (certificate #37903) | Iceland:14 (original rating) | Iceland:16 (video rating) | Malaysia:18SG (uncut version) | Malaysia:U (cut version) | Philippines:R-18 | Argentina:13 | Australia:MA (original rating) | Australia:M (TV rating) | Canada:14A | Chile:14 | Finland:K-15 | France:U | Germany:16 (f) (bw) | Hong Kong:IIB | India:A | Netherlands:16 | New Zealand:R15 | Norway:15 | Peru:14 | Singapore:M18 | Singapore:PG (cut) | South Korea:15 | Spain:13 | Sweden:15 | Switzerland:16 (canton of Geneva) | Switzerland:16 (canton of Vaud) | UK:15

Filming Locations:

Babelsberg, Potsdam, Brandenburg, Germany

Company:

Paramount Pictures

Trivia:

The character of Ludmilla is a possible reference to another famous Soviet sniper, Lyudmila Pavlichenko, who had over 300 kills, even more than that of Vassili Zaitsev, who had around 257 kills.

Goofs:

Continuity: Where the Russian soldiers charge the German lines, and retreat to be shot by their own troops, the same Russian is seen dying twice, once on the advance and again during retreat.

Quotes:

Vasilli: [narrating] Autumn, 1942. Europe lies crushed beneath the Nazi jackboot. The German Third Reich is at the height of its power. Hitler's Armies are charging through the heart of the Soviet Union towards the oil fields of Asia. One last obstacle remains, a city on the Volga, where the fate of the world is being decided - Stalingrad.

Movie Connections:

Featured in "Siskel & Ebert & the Movies: (2001-03-03)" (2001)

A fascinating film about the strategy of two great snipers…

In "Enemy at the Gates," the future of the greatest battle of World War II, would be decided between a young Russian sniper and an aristocratic sharpshooter from Germany sent to kill him… Jude Law and Ed Harris sit for hours waiting for the right moment… It was a duel set in the siege of Stalingrad… Stalingrad was one of the biggest and bloodiest battles of World War II, and in the midst of this huge battle, these two soldiers were hunting each other down…

The film opens with the harrowing transport of thousand of Russian soldiers across the Volga River to Stalingrad… The recruits were packed onto steamers, barges, whatever they could find to ferry them across the river… All that under a deluge of shells, bombs and explosions…

By the time Vassili arrives to Stalingrad, the Nazis have a distinct edge, and Soviet morale is at an all-time low…

Leading the Russians in their seemingly futile defense is Nikita Kruschev, played by Bob Hoskins… The Germans, at that time, were overrunning the place and the Russians were in an appalling state… It was the most awful battle of the war…

Joseph Fiennes plays Danilov, an idealistic Russian officer who passionately speaks about his belief in getting the troops to turn the grave situation in Stalingrad around… He finds the perfect inspiration in Vassili…

Rachel Weisz plays a young woman who volunteers to help in the war effort… She's literally protecting the people she grew up with… When she meets Vassili, he just has a natural intelligence, a natural instinct…

Jude Law is remarkable as the young sharpshooter Vassili Zaitsev who conveyed both humanity and intensity… There's such a fierce intelligence and liveliness in his eyes… He can also be very quiet and internal… Vassili found the complexity within the silence and stillness… In fact to be a sniper is very much about a man of action through stillness… Vassili represented the ultimate hero, the symbol of someone who could instill hope and belief in victory amongst the troops, because his skills as a sniper were unparalleled…

Ed Harris played Major Konig, the German sharpshooter sent to hunt down Vassili… He knows that Vassili was picking off German officers with some regularity, and was becoming a folk hero for the Russian soldiers as well as the Russian populace... He decided to eliminate him…

The casting of Ed Harris opposite Jude Law resulted in a striking visual link between their characters… They both have these unbelievably penetrating blue eyes… And director Jean-Jacques Annaud began to see the duel through their eyes… And one of the first shots of Ed Harris was a close-up of his blue eyes…

Annaud painted the tensions very clearly and concentrated purely on the eyes of the Jude Law and Harris and, of course, on their rifles and how they were hidden and what they were doing… Basically, the core of his camera is the duel of their eyes, duel of men, duel of snipers, therefore a confrontation of people that scan the surrounding buildings, and try to decipher what they see…