WORDS OF WAR
(director: James Strong; screenwriter: Eric Poppen; cinematographer: Mike Eley; editor: Davis Charap; music: Snomi Hallgrimsson; cast: Maxine Peake (Anna Politkovskaya), Jason Isaacs (Sasha, Anna’s husband), Ben Miles (Yuri Schekochhikhin), Ellie Bamber (Elena), Ciaran Hinds (Dmitry, editor), Naomi Battrick (VeraPolitkovskaya), Harry Lawley (Ilya Politkovskaya), Alec Newman (Major Popov), Ian Hart (Russian military agent); Runtime: 117; MPAA Rating: R; producers: Paul Brennan, Kia Jam, Mark Maxey, Miriam Segal; Rolling Pictures/Decal; 2025 UK-in English, Russian, Chechen, with subtitles)
“Passably effective biopic on the late brave Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya.”
Reviewed by Dennis Schwartz
Brit helmer James Strong (“United”) directs this passably effective biopic on the late brave Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya (Maxine Peake), who was born in 1958 and died in 2006, who deserves a more thought-out biopic. Anna was known for her resourcefulness, her daring stories, for upsetting Russia’s despotic strongman Putin, and her critical coverage of the Second Chechen War that exposed the Russian attempts at genocide. She was a journalist for Novaya Gazeta, the only independent newspaper in Russia. Her editor (Ciaran Hinds) always had her back.
Eric Poppen’s script is by the numbers and fails to fully capture her emotionally spirited call to the world for independent journalism, though Peake gives a fine performance doing her best to get at her character’s passion for life.
The film begins in 1999, showing Anna at work, trying to get the truth out to the Russian people. In 2004 there was an attempt to poison Anna on an airplane, resulting in her being in a compromised hospital she escaped from with the help of her editor and adult children (Naomi Battrick & Harry Lawley). It ends in 2006 when she was fatally shot by Putin’s agents in her Moscow apartment building after failing to heed his warnings about censoring her reporting. It took place on Putin’s birthday on Oct. 7th.
Anna was frustrated after trying to get the Russians to speak out against Putin’s Chechen War, as most of the citizens were too afraid to tell her their true feelings. She got the same reactions with the Chechens in Grozny, who refused to openly talk to her because they could not trust a Russian reporter. She also made enemies with the Russian military, who despised her anti-war stance. In the film, the Army sends someone (Ian Hart) to spy on her (which is a fictional episode).
This was not an officially sanctioned biopic, as her nervous family never gave it its stamp of approval, wishing to stay out of the limelight.
REVIEWED ON 5/13/2025 GRADE: B
dennisschwartzreviews.com