Indestructible

This film begins in World War 2 with a young Russian officer by the name of "Semyon Konovalov" (Andrey Chernyshov) scanning the area with his binoculars and to his horror finding a German panzer aiming its gun directly at the tank he is on. When the shell hits it he is thrown out into a field and all but one member of his crew is killed. Thinking that everyone is dead the German panzer then moves on to another Russian tank stuck in the mud leaving both Russian soldiers to be picked up afterward and taken to a surgical hospital for life-saving treatment. Once recovered Semyon is assigned to a military school as an instructor to train new tankers on Russian tactics. Eventually, after much insistence on his part, he is then sent back to the field where he is given a KV-1 heavy tank to command and it's at this time that the film really takes off. Now rather than reveal any more I will just say that this was a very good "tank film" which incorporates a realistic military background, good drama and some excellent special effects and action. It was only after reading that it was inspired by true events that I did some research and found some very noticeable embellishments that were totally unnecessary and led to a slightly lower score than I had originally given. For example, the entire situation with Semyon's wife "Pavla Chumak" (Olga Pogodina) was rather difficult to accept once I had finished my research. There were other minor issues here and there but that particular one aside, this was still a good film for the most part and I have rated it accordingly. Above average.

A russian woman who's a mechanical engineer travels to the front to be with her husband and to fix his KV1 heavy tank. and in the final battle thru all of the bad crap that happens in battle, she ends up as the driver of his tank, and together they kill 16 german panzer IVs. boy, they don't make movies like this anymore. why can't hollywood make movies like this?, actually I know why, at the same time in America it was illegal for a woman to be an engineer. turns all of the bad crap in war into a really fun movie, and I spent a year in Iraq and know about bad crap in war.

Over the last decades war movies have become more realistic, showing the horrors and terrifying experiences soldiers of all nations are exposed to under battle. Since 1945 German war movies have almost always been Anti-war movies, like "Die Brücke", "Das Boot" and later "Stalingrad" and therefore leaving the audience depressive after viewing it. American War movies have mostly been glorifying vehicles for some kind of hero, which made them a bigger hit at the box office. That has basically first begun to change with "Apocalypse Now" and later the brilliant "Saving Private Ryan". British war movies are maybe kind of in-between and very well narrated with "1917" as the most recent, brilliant example. Most of those successful war movies have in common, that they bring us the persons and the events closer with high credibility and get the audience emotionally connected to the main characters - that is not the case with "The Tankers". The strange behavior of the male main character tank commander Konovalov towards his wife/ex wife, entering the story as a brilliant tank engineer, is never really explained. He is only described as a brilliant tactician but egocentric and ruthless man, for whom it is quite difficult to evolve any kind of sympathy. The background/charcters of the other tank crew members are only described on the surface if at all, they don't have their own story. But they all die "nicely" with "sleeping" eyes and as man doing their duty. You just don't buy it. The movie promotes the heroic efforts of his KV 1 tank crew under the battle of Rostov and it is certainly understandable that Mosfilm would like to give the russian audience russian heros - they just didn't touch me.

They put some efforts in the tank battle scenes and usually russian war movies are, when it comes to WW II tanks and material, more accurate than western movies. But the fighting scenes are just not convincing at all! 10+ German Panzerkampfwagen IV attacking one russian KV 1 tank exposed on a hill top with the apparently long range 75 mm KwK 40 which could penetrate 40 mm steel on 700 m distance, making no significant damage at all!! Even without being a nerd, when watching those scenes, the movie almost appears comic-like. The movie show a lot of russian war material and if you are interested in that it's worth watching, but it never get's you carried away.

And, on top of that, VERY bad CGI: tanks always explode in flames. Also, Tigers in Russia? Come on...

Ok not just by Russian WWII movie standards (which after seeing quite a few of them) can be about as hit and miss as some of tbe German shooting is usually portrayed in them, this is not a bad movie.

I'm not gonna go into a long review here but, as someone that's seen a lot of these Russian war movies (thank you prime video) I can say honestly that "Tankers" deserves more than a 5.1

I'll just say the acting/script is pretty average but, the action scenes are not at all bad. And as someone that knows a pretty fair amount about the war on the eastern front, historically they didn't do a bad job there either.

Bottom line there's alot of crap out there in this genre and this isn't crap. It's not oscar worthy but, if you enjoy the genre, and are looking for a streaming wwii movie you havent seen yet, you shouldn't find it an hour and a half totally wasted.