Inspiring, colourful and exciting film from well-known and respected filmmaker, director, writer, bodybuilder, Mr. Universe triple winner, Golden Globe reviewer, etc, etc. The new dawn of westerns appears before us in this fabulous movie, where one can see a really good bunch of talented actors, fantastic landscapes and professionally reconstructed Wild West town, thoroughly depicted historical scenes and outstanding performances. Drawn from timeless classics like Eastwood's series, "Gunfight at Rio Bravo" shows a lot respect for prior generations, but also great potential for future sequels. Hail to Alexander!

Well, I kind of enjoyed the film. ) Though it is not perfect. The main problem, in my view, it is mixed genre.

If it is an Action Thriller for adults then following parts are well done:

• cruelty and atrocity scenes;
• death and loss scenes;
• fight scenes;
• acting of some actors is pretty decent.

• plot simple as nail;
• Alexander Nevsky, notorious for awkward acting, intentionally playing Terminator (by the way, if he plays it intentionally and everyone got it, does it mean that he is a good actor?);
• Nevsky's character beats Rey from Star Wars as Mary Sue. Singlehandedly (in the fight he had not even a scratch);
• dialogs on the level of 5th year of school (I wonder how actors in the scenes managed to keep serious faces);
• eclectic costumes, some of which hardly distinguishable from modern wear (kids don't care much about such stuff anyway!);
• over the top acting of some actors (in that way kids can better understand characters);
• one dimentional characters (there could be some cause or motivation for bad guys explaining their cruelty and attrocities to the vilagers -- the same terror and shock tactics of North in the Civil War, for example. And there could be inner conflict for both sides. But for kids it is too complex and boring! Evil guys should be just evil);
• no arcs of characters at all (exept those who were killed -- they've got their lesson!);
• easy happy end (though, they killed Kenny again, the ba stards!);
• too clean and modern and well-nourished look of some characters (it is easier for kids to imagine themselves in hero's place);
• special props that play no role in the plot at all (the 1980-s heavy metal jacket -- is it a prototype of a buletproof jacket, which gives the hero an advantage in pistol street fjght? Nop! Kids do not buy it!).

Not exactly western, but some simple 80's action flick with unexpected historical parallels.

Strongest parts:

• Fantastic music by Sean Murray,
• Based on real life russian historical character with complex fate,
• It's good to see Olivier, Matthias and Alexander back to B-action,
• Final showdown is pretty cool. 3 mins of Final duel looks like a big cinema - thanks to the epic musical score, camera work, beautiful sunset and the deadpan faces of the two "Big" actors. Matthias is just one scary dude.

• 80 mins short,
• Budget, sets, costumes, some acting and etc.