Fortress of spirit, courage and heroic sacrifice of a Russian soldier were reflected in many works of art, however, unfortunately, the theme of the feat of a soldier of the Russian Empire during the First World War all this time was not often used by creative people as a source of inspiration when creating artworks.
"Osovets. Fortress of the Spirit"
The feature documentary released in 2018 about the battle for the fortress Osovets not only restored this historical injustice, but also became evidence that the First World War was a period poorly studied from the point of view of creativity, definitely worthy of the attention of cultural figures.
Historical events
Cinema “Osovets. Fortress of the Spirit ”is dedicated to events that took place during the third stage of the First World War, when German troops stormed the Osovec fortress in Poland.
Osowiec was built by the Russians after the third partition of Poland as a supporting fortress and had a strategically important purpose. Not far from the fortress was the village of Osovice, from where the garrison received food and fodder.
During the offensive operation, the fortress was besieged by German troops, more than once making active attempts to capture the structure. After the first two failed attacks, a third was launched, but this time the German command decided to spray poisonous gas, which is one of the mixtures of chlorine, at the positions of Russian soldiers.
The German command believed that the lack of gas protection kits for Russian soldiers was to ensure the success of the offensive operation and the capture of the fortress.
However, the Russian garrison of the fortress, comprising several incomplete companies, not only successfully repelled the attack of the German troops, but also continued to hold the fortress for some time, leaving it only after an official order from the command to retreat.
The idea
The idea to make a film about this episode of the First World War appeared at the TV channel “Russia 24” at the end of 2017. The head of the publishing department of Wargaming, which became a partner in the filming channel, Andrei Muravyov, has repeatedly noted that the company took up the screening of precisely these events, because the First World War was not paid any attention from artists of our time. The events of the Great Patriotic War are repeatedly retouched, even without changes in the scenarios of fifty years ago, and it seems as if they were deliberately silent about the Russian man’s feat in the First World War: there are not enough books on this subject, nor feature films, nor even computer games.
The filmmakers decided to restore historical justice and make a feasible contribution to the reflection of the heroism and fortress of the spirit of the Russian soldier in cinema.
History of creation
A lot of historical evidence has been preserved about the First World War, most of which are memoirs that belonged to officers and soldiers of the Russian army. These memoirs, stored in archives, were almost never published in full measure, partly due to the lack of demand for this topic in historical circles and its unpopularity with artists.
For a long time, company employees studied historical reality, devoting a lot of time to getting acquainted with historical documents, eyewitness accounts, graphs and drawings of those years.
Filming
Filming took only two months, including the preparatory period. Due to the company’s presence of a large number of experienced specialists in computer graphics and software modeling, the documentary film “Osovets. Fortress of the Spirit ”received excellent special effects, highly praised by critics.
Most of the battle scenes were shot using motion capture technology, as well as with the active use of computer graphics. During editing, several scenes from a real preserved historical chronicle were included in the film. Shots from the past millennium have undergone serious video processing, as well as the consistent colorization of each frame. This required additional work with the overall color scheme of the film.
It is worth noting that professional actors did not participate in the creation of the film. All roles were performed by company employees. For many project participants, this was the first experience in working on an artwork in the field of cinema.
The music for the film was created by Wargaming's full-time composer Victor Sologub, also known as the composer for many episodes of World Of Tanks.
Well-known experts on the history of Russia, the history of Germany, as well as world militarist history took part in the work on the documentary part of the film, who not only expressed their opinions and voiced the facts, but also became consultants on shooting battle scenes.
Plot
The film "Osovets. Fortress of the Spirit ”tells of real historical events that occurred on August 6, 1915. Thanks to careful work on the script and everyday details, the filmmakers managed to reproduce the events of that day almost verbatim.
The authors of the short feature film skillfully emphasized not only on the historical event, but on the heroes of the story. Each character is unique, has its own story and character revealed in the work. Much attention was paid to the everyday side of the Russian and German armies: weapons, uniforms, types of equipment, military ranks. Historians note that all this was reproduced with reliable accuracy and incredible thoroughness.
The documentary part of the work was also excellently done: a large number of experts were involved in the analysis of the battle, detailed information was given on the number of victims, methods of battle, participating army units, etc.
Reviews
Reviews of "Fortress of the Spirit" were not long in coming. Immediately after the online premiere of the short film, enthusiastic reviews from the audience began to appear on the sites. A little later, some authoritative critics in the world of cinema expressed their positive opinion about the new video from Wargaming. Gradually, the film began to spread on the Web, receiving more and more enthusiastic reviews.
All people who expressed their opinion about “Fortress of the Spirit”, first of all, note the historical authenticity of the film, respect for the events that have taken place, and the authors of the project are attentive to everyday and military details.
The atmosphere of the film, the cast and the soundtrack of the picture also received high marks.
“Osovets. Fortress of the Spirit ”became a kind of monument to the heroic feat of the Russian people, reflecting the courage and valor of the Russian soldier.