In Polish the movie was called "Jak rozpetalem druga wojne swiatowa". Translated into Russian, the name of the film looks like - "How I Unleashed World War II". But in our country it was released under the title "The adventures of Dolas the cannoneer".
Judging by the extremely small number of reviews on this film on IMDB and on the complete absence of references to this film on the Rotten Tomatoes website, this picture is practically unknown in the world. Except, perhaps, for Poland and Hungary. There is no data on the demonstration of the film in the USSR, but I definitely remember that I watched it being pupil of of either the 6th or 7th grade, i.e., somewhere in the beginning of 70-s.
And the second time I watched this movie recently. And it was interesting to compare my impressions with me then, half a century younger, and today.
I remember that then I laughed wildly at the session. A lot of funny moments in this movie.
Today, voluntarily or involuntarily, other points attracted attention. Well, firstly, I remember exactly that then, in the beginning of the 70s, the film consisted of two episodes and lasted a total of somewhere from two and a half to three hours. The full version, which I watched recently, lasts almost 4 hours and consists of 3 episodes. This is how much was cut out of the film by Soviet censorship! Weigh roughly - a whole third of the film. However, neither then nor today would I be able to sit in the movie theater for 4 hours on this film. It's good that now there is a lot of opportunities to watch movies at home on the couch.
Secondly, during a recent viewing, I drew attention to a phrase uttered by one of the female characters when the action took place in Yugoslavia: "The Germans will be here soon. They have already occupied Hungary." Then, in childhood, my friends and I did not pay much attention to this phrase. Of course, bad fascists occupied good Hungary. This is today, when we know that Hungary was the original and most faithful satellite of Nazi Germany and fought against the Red Army until the very end, when even the Germans themselves began to give up, this phrase cuts the ear. Since the Nazis had no need to "occupy" Hungary. At least, in 1939-1940.
Thirdly, I do not remember whether the episode with the Polish officers in the POW camp was present in the version that was shown in Soviet times, or not. Most likely not. Now compare with numerous photo documents about the camp conditions for Soviet officers in German camps for POWs. And as they say, feel the difference.
Such a comparison is especially relevant today, when some Polish, and not only Polish, politicians decided to attribute the beginning of the World War II exclusively to Germany and the Soviet Union.
However, I think that everyone who watched this film in the 70s and watched it today will be able to find other changes in their impressions.
