Rent The Rifleman (2019)

WW1 drama from the Baltic front - The Rifleman review by CD

The voice dubbing into English on this film lets it down which is a shame as the actors do a reasonable job and the characters are quite well defined. The action sequences in the Film range from quite powerful and realistic to rather unlikely,  and the film becomes rather directionless at times.  Still, worth a watch to see WW1 from a different geo and perspective.

Another Slice of WW1 Horrors - The Rifleman review by CP Customer

Centred around the attempted take over of Latvia by the army of the Kaiser as it tries to tale control of Latvia and the privations that the country went through to stave off their take over.  Interesting from the view point of inter woven stores about specific soldiers and their exploits during the conflict.  

Dreadful dubbing but this episodic Latvian nationalist film based on 1930s novel worth a watch - The Rifleman review by PV

I hate dubbed foreign films - why no option for original language and subtitles?

That lets this down. As does the episodic nature of the film - which comes from a novel by a Latvian Nationalist in 1920s/30s - watch until the very end to find out what happened to that author when the USSR invaded at the start of the Second World War.

Probably reads better as a novel, to be honest. No attempt to hide the Latvian nationalist bias of the film as that is the novel - I am sure it is a better read than this film is a watch. Screenplays have to have clear 3 act structure and focus, so much of what is in novels has to be ditched. For better or worse.

Some jumps here between episodes and confusing politics - so best familiarise yourself a bit about Latvia history pre and post WWI and the Russian empire and 1917's effects there with Lenin's Bolsheviks to fully appreciate it.

Watch together with MR JONES maybe about a Brit Welshman exposing the famine in Ukraine post WWI too, caused by Stalin and USSR.

2.5 stars rounded up to 3 - JUST.