Alexander The Warrior Saint

Title: Alexander The Warrior Saint (15)

Year: 2008

Running Time: 106 minutes

Director: Igor Kalyonov

Cast: Anton Pampushnyy (Knyaz Aleksandr), Igor Botvin (Ratmor), Pavel Trubiner (Dmitry) Notes: In Russian. Nominated for one award.

Rating: 8

Thoughts:   Prince Aleksandr faces the Horde in the east, and the Teutonic order and Sweden in the west. As he is then challenged by plots from within, he must defend himself.

This is very well put together with some tight direction, more than overcoming what was undoubtedly a limited budget.

It's the sort of film that you know would have been a massive hit if it had been from Hollywood. There isn't a plethora of people for the battle scenes, the sets aren't really expansive enough, but it's definitely got something.

Of course, it's all based on an interesting story, with the real Alexander winning some great victories when quite young. The film keeps going well, the actors all doing their part to deliver the script.

As mentioned, the direction is very good and it all ends up looking very nice, despite any limitations. This is a great example of a lesser-known foreign language origin story, and is well worth the effort.