The Other Side

There is not an ounce of journalistic integrity in this documentary. Sean appears to be an unabashed Russian fanboi. When soldiers make blatantly false statements, there is no push back or effort to fact check. Isn't that the whole point of a documentary? To find the truth? There is also no attempt at putting the subject matter in the context of the thousands of war crimes the people being documented have committed. The crimes of Bucha have been well documented, yet when a soldier says it is all a lie, there is no challenge from the interviewer. This deserves 0 stars, and all involved to be labeled as Russian operatives.

I disagree with the other comments that state this is purely propaganda. The purpose of this documentary is not to justify the war. I believe it offers a perspective on how Russians rationalize the war to themselves. It also shows that people fighting on either side of a war are also just humans.

That being said, I recognize that their statements often went unchallenged, which makes the conversations a lot less interesting. I can understand the journalist didn't want to escalate the situations, which is likely why he didn't press further.

I also think that there weren't too many particularly exciting or jaw dropping moments. The trailer already contains most meaningful scenes.

Nonetheless, it gives interesting insight into the other side of the war, which has scarcely been shown in mainstream media.

This attempt at a documentary offers the worst of russian soldiers to paint themselves in a positive light while they commit war crimes and genocide in Ukraine. The film maker fist pumping to urge them on is testament to the level of journalistic integrity conducted by this man. The open and free member this man worships these war criminals is embarrassing for any true journalist.

A russian soldier is freely unchallenged when he states "we are not monsters" - a soldier from a command that conducted the well documented horrors in Bucha and Lyman two locations where the worst known atrocities have occurred.

Fundamentally poor as a documentary.

Morally devoid in its intent.

This documentary reveals to some extend the situation for the separatists in Donbas - and it actually gives some nuance to the motives that Russia had for the 2014 intervention and the special military operation/invasion in 2022. It touches on the NATO-enlargement, which is a historical fact that is usually ignored in the West ... and it reports the Kiev-governments bombings on the separatist territory since 2014; bombings and killings we never hear of in the West.

On several occasions the interviewing/journalism in depth is rather poor; Lanagan is often more interested in the russian aggressions in Ukraine than the Kiev-governments aggressions i Donbas. He never pursuits the story of a population that the coup/revolution in 2014 ignored and damned as russian agents while attacking and subordinating them. All this is well documented, but Lanagans curiosity isn't really there. In that perspective, he might as well could have stayed home in safe London.

Lanagan also gets a possibility to investigate the other side of the Bucha story - which was called a genocide by the Kiev-government and by western powers (until they realised that massacres/warcrimes was a more realistic accusation), but he avoids this by proposing that it's not safe to talk further on ... and then he clings on to the western narrative. That is not quality journalism, but epistemological information control according to Lanagan's ideological narrative.

The best in this documentary is the depiction of the frontlines, Lanagan visits - and some political diversity (which Lanagan notoriously calls 'cracks') amongst the Donbas fighters. Lanagan touches briefly on this, but he's not reflecting on the historical view he's offered from 'the other side' ... and most notably he is not interested in the reasons for the civil uprise in eastern Ukraine after the coup in Kiev, 2014. Why, I don't know ... but it could be caused by his western cultivation which urges him to believe and enforce that 'the other side' mostly is dark. Whatever, these projections/prejudgments and the bias surely kicks down the quality ... but still I recommend everyone to watch it; it is far better and more informative than most of the western input on the matter.

This documentary is supposed to show the "other side" of a genocidal war. If you go in with the knowlegde that massacres like Butscha, which has been confirmed to have happened by 3 independent investigations (UN, Amnesty and NYT), have happened; that Russia is shelling civilians and that their troops are actively targeting civilians you will be thoroughly disappointed.

Mr. Langan interviews a Wagner member about Butscha, who mentions that the Russian army retreated orderly from the town and the above mentioned massacre is a western lie. He does not tell the viewer about the investigations and the fact that there is drone footage of the russian army targeting civilians.

When interviewing other russian soldiers, Mr. Langan also does not ask questions you'd expect a journalist to ask, such as: "What is your opnion on you invading a foreign country?". Instead, his priority liies within asking if how they feel at the current moment, the answer to which, given that they are in warzone, should be obvious.

He tries to garner sympathy with the invading genocidal russian forces. That can be seen in this documentary too. Instead of remaining neutral, which usually involves carrying a press-specific shrapnel vest (usually blue, black but generally not camouflaged) with a big "PRESS" on the fron and the back, he instead gets a russian vest, with camouflage. Over the course of the film, you get to see a russian flag appear. Another point is him high-fiving russian troops.

Overall, this is a sorry excuse for a film and waste of time. I never had the hunch that the movie wanted to tell the story from the russian side, but rather create a "but both sides are bad" whataboutism to legitimize the russian invasion.

In my opnion, this movie should be taken down from all streaming sites and Mr. Langan should be ashamed of himself. It feels to me as if he'd been alives during World War 2, he'd have gone to Nazi-Germany and interviewed the guards at Auschwitz to ask them if the task of murdering hundreds of people is mentally tasking or if they enjoy it.