One of World War II’s most devastating and deadly battles was not an armed fight at all. It was the 900-day siege of Leningrad, a protracted Nazi operation that took the lives of millions of soldiers and civilians. With [Leningrad] writer-director Alexander Buravsky crafts a film that is part pure war epic and part dramatic account of one of history’s ugliest episodes. A British journalist separated from her American lover becomes the target of a KGB investigation and is effectively isolated within the city. The only help she can find comes from a militiawoman and two children, and together they fight to stay alive, while a vicious campaign that leads to mass starvation, despair, and death unfolds around them. [Leningrad] boasts an all-star international cast (Mira Sorvino, Gabriel Byrne, Armin Mueller-Stahl, Alexander Abdulov) in recounting a gruesome incident that is, sadly, fading into the murk of history. Ambitious and harrowing, Buravsky renders in vivid color what has only been seen on screen once before, in the 1943 documentary [Siege of Leningrad].