Best Russian history movies
A curated collection of popular history movies from Russia.

Siberian Sniper (2021)
Siberian Sniper (2021)
After months of exhausting trench warfare, most of Major Belyaev's battalion was destroyed. The area is ruled by German aces snipers. Hope for replenishment collapses when the convoy, in which the Soviet snipers were traveling, falls under a German airstrike. A handful of soldiers and a young hunter from Yakutia, Yegor Cheerin, survive.

Air (2024)
Air (2024)
Young female fighter pilots arrive to the frontline. They have different stories and different fates. They are getting older, falling in love and lose their closest ones as well as take their place in the world of men. The air has become their home. However, at war no one knows whose fate is to live and who is doomed to die.

Tzadik (2023)
Tzadik (2023)
In 1942, Red Army officer Nikolai Kiselyov receives orders to evacuate over 200 Jewish women, children, and elderly men facing brutality and death in Nazi-occupied Belarus. These exhausted, starving, terrified and bereaved people, deeply scarred by the horrors they have witnessed, must trek hundreds of kilometers along forest paths to regain hope of survival and faith in the future.

Agitprop Team 'Kill the enemy!' (2007)
Agitprop Team 'Kill the enemy!' (2007)
World War II is raging on the Eastern front but the soldier Nikanor has been sent to Siberia: bot as a prisoner, but as the leader of a motley group of entertainers who travel from village to village giving concerts. Still, Big Brother is watching and when the entertainers encounter a strange man in the woods there is trouble brewing. One of the performers falls in love with the mysterious backwoodsman, but the secret service is after him, too.

Michael Mil (2019)
Michael Mil (2019)
A story about Russian aerospace engineer and scientist, creator of well-known Soviet helicopter Mi-1 and the founder of Mil Moscow Helicopter Plant

The Oath (2020)
The Oath (2020)
An impressing war drama, a story of life and heroism of Naum Balapan - an academic psychiatrist, Doctor of Medicine, a chief doctor of the Sevastopol psychiatric hospital since 1922. With the help of his wife he saved dozens of innocent people from Genocide during Nazi Occupation until his tragic death in 1942.

Zoya (2021)
Zoya (2021)
Fall of 1941. Freshly graduated from school, Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya volunteers for a partisan unit. During an assignment, her comrades are ambushed, and she is captured by the Nazis. She endures hours of grueling interrogations and horrendous torture, but defiantly refuses to divulge any information that would compromise other units’ partisan missions. She doesn’t even tell her captors her real name. Zoya’s sacrifice was not in vain; it ignited fire in the hearts of millions of people and became the symbol of selfless heroism during WWII. She is one of the most celebrated heroes of that time.

Razor (2014)
Razor (2014)
The Second World War is over. But after each war the human destinies are left. This film is about two of them. The former officer of the Wehrmacht. The former prisoner of the Nazi concentration camp.

Alexander: The Neva Battle (2008)
Alexander: The Neva Battle (2008)
Young prince Aleksandr has to hold out against two enemies - the Horde in the east and the Teutonic order and Sweden in the west. He discovers that some boyars are plotting against him and are ready to betray Novgorod to the Swedes and the Germans to boost their trade. Meanwhile, his best friend falls under suspicion, as somebody tries to poison the young prince at his own wedding feast. Aleksandr has no way out - to defend his people against the invaders and to find the true poisoner.

No Goodbyes (2018)
No Goodbyes (2018)
October 1941. Thousands of fascists troops are advancing on Kalinin to capture the city and therefore open a direct route to Moscow. There are two thousand people able to defend the city and they are without tanks or artillery. The only hope of holding the enemy off is in the fifth infantry division convoy, who are about to pass through Kalinin station. But saboteurs intend to do everything to keep this from happening. The head of the Kalinin garrison, Major Sysoyev, struggles to keep order and calm in the city, and himself falls under suspicion of involvement with the subversive enemy group.

The Hero (2016)
The Hero (2016)
Andrey Kulikov goes to Paris to visit the grave of his great-grandfather, Andrey Dolmatov, who had been an officer in the White Army during the Russian Revolution. On the headstone of the grave next to his great-grandfather's, he notices the face of a young woman. Later, while walking through Paris, Andrey sees a woman, Vera, who looks just like the young woman he had seen on the headstone. And so begins the telling of two love stories, separated by three generations and one hundred years.

Cursed and Forgotten (1999)
Cursed and Forgotten (1999)
Sergei Govorukhin, son of well known Soviet and Russian film director Stanislav Govorukhin, was a Russian scriptwriter and war correspondent. This is his first and only documentary, dealing with his feelings about the first war he covered - the first Chechen war - as well as his very cynical view of Russian society during this time. These feelings and opinions were shared by many other war correspondents and cameramen at the time. The author used heavily contrasting footage and sound to illustrate his point of the indifference of 90's/early 2000's Russian society towards the conflicts it found itself in after the Second World War.

Paradise Under The Shade of Swords (1992)
Paradise Under The Shade of Swords (1992)
19th century. Russia, one of the biggest and most powerful empires in the world is fighting a bloody war to subjugate the free peoples of the Caucasus. In 1828 Caucasian Imamate was established in order to unite Caucasian peoples against Russia under the banner of Islam. By 1834 the situation is dire. Ghazi-Muhammad, the leader of the Imamate, gets killed in an ambush by the Russian forces. One of his loyal warriors, Shamil, barely escapes alive. The fight must continue, but the future is uncertain.

Richard the Lionheart (1992)
Richard the Lionheart (1992)

The Conscience (2021)
The Conscience (2021)
Petrograd, Soviet Union, 1920s. Boris Letush, devastated by a personal tragedy, feels the need to put his conscience and his principles before the demands of the cruel system he serves, where law and justice are systematically ignored.

Telekinesis (2023)
Telekinesis (2023)
Moscow, 1977. Scientists are studying paranormal phenomena in a full secrecy. A professor-physicist, an expert in telekinesis and hypnosis, encounters an inexplicable force, the existence of which is impossible to believe in. Сonsequently, his daughter Anna finds out she is gifted with a horrifying deathful power.

Streltsov (2020)
Streltsov (2020)
By the age of twenty, Eduard Streltsov has everything one can dream of: talent, fame and love. He is the rising star of Soviet football. The whole country, with bated breath, expects victory from the national team at the upcoming World Cup where Streltsov is to face the great Brazilian football player Pelé. However, two days before the departure of the team, the sportsman’s enemies manage to destroy his career. When the door to big sport seems to be closed for good, Streltsov has to re-enter the field and prove that he is a true champion who is worth everybody’s love.

The Golden Age (2003)
The Golden Age (2003)
Historical period melodrama.

Wings Above Berlin (2022)
Wings Above Berlin (2022)
The year is 1941. Nazi Germany has declared war on the USSR and begins launching air assaults on Moscow and St. Petersburg. Stalin immediately orders a retaliatory air campaign under the code name “Wings over Berlin.” The closest entry point to Berlin from the USSR border was an airfield on the Estonian island Saaremaa in the Baltic Sea. It would be a 7-hour flight over enemy territory in outdated aircraft leaving no chance of survival for the tail crew members in case of attack. Despite overwhelming odds, the first units completed the mission and made it back to base safely, unlike many others that followed.

Angels of Revolution (2014)
Angels of Revolution (2014)
Five friends – a poet, an actor, a painter, an architect and a primitivist film director – are five red avant-garde artists who try to find the embodiment of their hopes and dreams in the young Soviet state. The Revolution is boiling up like a bottle with apple cider: winged service dogs and heart-shaped potatoes, dead Semashko, the People’s Commissar for Health, and cheerful angels, love for the Tsar and love for the young secretary Annushka, executions and pregnancies – everything is interlaced and inseparable!

Pushkin: The Last Duel (2006)
Pushkin: The Last Duel (2006)
The movie has reveal the last days of the famous and popular Russian poet - Alexander Pushkin. After the poet faced scandalous rumors that his wife Natalya Pushkina had embarked a love affair, Pushkin then challenged her brother in law to a duel!

The Miracle (2009)
The Miracle (2009)
The film is based on real events that took place in Samara in 1956 and known as the "Standing Zoe." During the holiday girl, without waiting her betrothed, removes the icon from the wall and Nicholas begins to dance with her, but suddenly freezes in place. This state continues for many months. Residents of the provincial town are frightened by this extraordinary event, which is cluttered with rumors and speculation. To try to understand the situation, there goes metropolitan newspaper journalist ...

18-14 (2007)
18-14 (2007)
Detective story set up in the time and place of young Pushkin, at Tsarskosel'sky Liceum.

Contribution (2016)
Contribution (2016)
Perm, Siberia, 1918. the central Siberian White guard corps under the command of a young general Anatoliy Pepelyaev have taken the city. the army is exhausted and running short on supplies. the General tasks the Permian merchants with collecting the money needed for the survival of the army much to their dismay. madame chagina, a rich widow answers the call and presents general with a massive diamond... only to have it mysteriously disappear the next day. recently sentenced to death red Army investigator Andrei murzin is brought in to nd the precious contribution. murzin must nd the diamond in exchange for a chance to save his life.

Tsar (2009)
Tsar (2009)
In 16th-century Russia in the grip of chaos, Ivan the Terrible strongly believes he is vested with a holy mission. Believing he can understand and interpret the signs, he sees the Last Judgment approaching. He establishes absolute power, cruelly destroying anyone who gets in his way. During this reign of terror, Philip, the superior of the monastery on the Solovetsky Islands, a great scholar and Ivan's close friend, dares to oppose the sovereign's mystical tyranny. What follows is a clash between two completely opposite visions of the world, smashing morality and justice, God and men. A grand-scale film with excellent leading roles by Mamonov and Yankovsky. An allegory of Stalinist Russia

Doctor Lisa (2020)
Doctor Lisa (2020)
The film is about a day in the life of Elizaveta Petrovna Glinka, also known as Doctor Liza. Moscow, 2012. The Glinka family prepares for a celebration: thirty years together. The closest friends are invited for dinner, the sons have arrived. Of course, Liza has freed up this day for her family. There’s just a trifle: to stop by the Fund and see the weekly patients at the Paveletsky Station. But the days of Doctor Liza are always full of surprises… In a hospital in a Moscow suburb a five-year-old girl is dying. The duty doctor has to discharge Eva. Due to medical formalities the child, who suffers from cancer, is left without painkillers. In utter despair, the girl’s father turns to Liza for help. When Liza cannot find a way to help the child within the system, she decides on a desperate act…

1612: Chronicles of the Dark Time (2007)
1612: Chronicles of the Dark Time (2007)
The czar of Russia has died and a power vacuum has developed. This period in the late 16th and early 17th century has been called "The Time of Troubles." There are many impostors who claim to the right to rule, but there's only one heir, the Czarina Kseniya Godunova. She has married a Polish military leader who wants to claim the Russian throne in her name so he can rule all of Russia. As the Poles move in on Moscow in an attempt to install the czarina on the throne, Andrei, a serf with a life-long infatuation of the czarina attempts to save her from her brutal Polish husband.

Iuda (2014)
Iuda (2014)
Judas, a seasoned thief, finds himself in the market square where Christ is giving a sermon and his apostles are collecting alms. He follows them and steals their money, only to be caught red-handed. Nevertheless, the Teacher forgives him. What is more, He invites the thief to become one of His followers and offers him a position as the group’s treasurer. Shocked by Christ’s unexpected offer, Judas decides to join the apostles, if only to figure out what is going on. He gradually starts to comprehend Christ’s message, but feels that the apostles are blindly following their teacher. Judas argues with them, and tries to defend his right to divine the truth of God. But when he fails to make them understand, he realizes that Christ’s teachings may sink into oblivion without benefiting humanity. His solution is to betray Christ. “By killing a man, have I not saved a God?”

The Horde (2012)
The Horde (2012)
It is the word "horde" that had meant, for many countries and nations, bloody raids and being under humilating contribution for centuries - a strange and scary world with its own rules and customs. To be or not to be for Rus (Ruthenia), that is the price of the one-man mission as he is departing to this world to accomplish a feat. The film tells the story of how Saint Alexius, the Metropolitan of Moscow and Wonderworker of All Russia, healed the Tatar Queen Taidula, Jani-Beg's mother, from blindness, in 1357.