Tense and violent WWII movie.

There's never much risk of reality intruding--just a lot of histrionic James Horner music nd plenty of designer stubble on the soldiers' faces.

Set-pieces get you so far (and Annaud delights in blowing this set to pieces), but the script's shortcomings aren't camouflaged by the decision to adopt Home Counties' accents as the film's lingua franca.

A terrific subject for a major motion picture — the Battle of Stalingrad, the bloodbath during which the conquering German army suffered one of its first major setbacks of World War II — receives only half-hearted treatment in this handsome production.