Civil War theme is not an easy piece to write about, let alone to shoot movie about. That was the very popular novel by a Russian / Soviet writer Alexey Tolstoy, and that was made into a movie in earlier years but not too well, so in 1977 this 13-episode saga was made and wow, what a huge improvement that was! The stellar cast of Soviet cinema's 70's stars shone brightly in this impeccably executed sags about pre- revolution, revolution and Civil War torn Russia. The tale of two sisters and their husbands, being separated by a bloody war, is very serious, decent, touching, deep and sincere. The pace is well calculated, and even long dialogs never bore. The battle scenes are done with a marvelous accuracy, and deep tragic feeling of bloodbath is depicted here with all seriousness. What is very good about this saga is the lack of propaganda clichés - both sides of the war are shown with sympathy, pain, understanding and love. Pity, there are not so many deep movies like this one now.
