The 3 Rooms of Melancholia (2004)

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0424272/

Movie
http://www.fileserve.com/file/2DJRMBm

Subtitles hardcoded English

A Film by Pirjo Honkasalo 

Russian/Chechen with English Subs hardburned into it. 

This award-winning, stunningly beautiful documentary reveals how the Chechen War has psychologically affected children in Russia and in Chechnya. Divided into three episodes or 'rooms,' the film is characterized by an elegantly paced, observational style, which uses little dialog, minimal voice-over commentary and a spare but evocative musical score.

Room No. 1, "Longing," set in a military academy in Kronstadt, near St. Petersburg, portrays the highly regimented lives of the young cadets, most of them from broken or dysfunctional families, who are being trained for future roles in the Russian army. While showing their military drills, classroom sessions, church ceremonies, and recess period, the film briefly profiles several of the boys, whose stories reflect the political turmoil of contemporary Russia. 

Room No. 2, "Breathing," filmed in Grozny, the capital of Chechnya, the former Soviet republic fighting for its independence, shows the widespread destruction wrought by the Russian shelling and bombardment, a city where families struggle to survive in barely habitable buildings, packs of stray dogs roam the streets, Russian military vehicles clog the roads, soldiers monitor roadblocks, and a courageous woman attempts to rescue orphaned or semi-orphaned children from the violence. 

Room No. 3, "Remembering," filmed in the neighboring Islamic republic of Ingushetia, focuses on children in refugee camps and in a makeshift orphanage, including a young boy found living in a cardboard box, a 19-year-old girl traumatized by her rape at the age of 12 by Russian soldiers, and a roomful of children transfixed by televised images of the deadly aftermath of the crisis in which a Moscow theater audience was held hostage by Chechen terrorists. 
THE 3 ROOMS OF MELANCHOLIA, which poetically blends sustained close-ups of children's faces with gray, fog-shrouded landscapes, illuminates the emotional devastation wrought on youngsters who have little or no understanding of the historical and political reasons for the bitter conflict. In an even more troubling sense, the film also makes clear how the seeds of hatred are being instilled in young minds that will likely fuel the conflict into the next generation. 

"Cinematically beautiful... stands out for its artistic quality as well as its measured, indirect, profoundly moving, and deeply engaging approach to the material... It will have maximum impact for those who know (or will soon learn) something about human rights abuses and the impact of war on civilians, making it a good choice for undergraduates."ΓΓé¼ΓÇ¥Steve Carlton-Ford, Armed Forces & Society. 
 Pirjo Honkasalo