As Far As My Feet Will Carry Me

Introduction

It's rare that you see too much these days on the aftermath of the fighting on the Russian Front, most documentary series focus only on the fall of Berlin. But what of all those German soldiers swept up in the advance of the massive Russian army, surrendering in their thousands due to lack of supplies and reinforcements? As Far As My Feet Will Carry Me, based on a book published back in the 1950's sheds some light on this with a quite incredible tale of a man pitted against one of the most hostile environments on earth.

Leutenant Clemens Forell (Bernhard Betterman) is sent to the Russian Front in late 1944, forced to say goodbye to his pregnant wife and young daughter. Without much further ado, we skip Forell's battle experiences and see him again at the end of the war in front of a Russian military tribunal. Found guilty of actions against the partisans (with no more detail provided than that), Forell is sentenced to 25 years hard labour.

Herded like cattle into railway carriages, Forell and his fellow prisoners are transported East for thousands of miles on the railway with the cold conditions killing some of the prisoners before they get to their destination. When the train finally stops, they realise that they're not finished yet and are forced on a march across an arid, snowy landscape to the gulag at Cape Deznhev, on the Eastern coast of Russia. The number of guards is minimal, there are no fences and no watch towers and it becomes very obvious why very quickly - there's nowhere to go.

Forell falls foul of the chief of security, Oberleutnant Kamenev (Anatoly Kotenyov), who not only wants to break every man under him but also thinks that the object of his affections, a female Russian doctor, has a thing for Forell. Forell makes a quick escape early on but is easily caught and punished, coming down with a high fever as a result of his punishment. Dr Stauffer (Michael Mendl), the German medical officer, persuades Forell to escape using Stauffer's equipment and plan. Stauffer was planning to escape himself but has come to the conclusion that he is suffering from cancer and therefore wouldn't make it.

Forell takes up the mantle offered him and makes good his escape, beginning a journey that will take him 6,800 miles overland to Iran and take over 3 years. Hot on his trail is Kamenev...

Picture

The cinematography for this film is simply superb, the environment depicted both spectacularly beautiful and inhospitably desolate at the same time. East Asia is a vast place with different types of climates and this film does a really good job of showing just how different a place this part of the world can be, with various different indigenous peoples making up its population.

Overall

This is a great film that despite being 153 minutes long never seems to drag at all. In fact, once its off, it doesn't really let you go until the very end. Based on a true story, it's quite obvious how it ends but what isn't so true is the hunt for one man by Russian officer Kamenev. Other than the bits at the end, and in particular the final confrontation on the bridge, there really doesn't seem to be a place for it.

What this film is excellent at depicting is that whilst Governments may go to war, it isn't necessarily the case that all that Governments subjects will or that they support what is being done in their name. In fact, based on this film, the reach of the Soviet dictatorship is pretty stretched and left to their own devices the majority of Russian peoples will help someone who needs it, regardless of their nationality.

This is a fantastic film that really shows you the horrors of both a forced march and also just how incredible a feat Forell's journey to Iran was. Ironically, despite escaping from Russia to Iran, Forell was imprisoned and was to be hung as a Russian spy. What saved him was that his accusers thought he would come up with a better cover story if he was truly engaged in espionage.

Put aside three hours and watch this film, it's great...