Friedrich Ermler: She Defends the Motherland (1943)
Description: The leader of this partisan band, who has lost her husband and child to Nazi marauders, and whose powers seem to include joining the younger members of the group in marriage, uses her unshakeable faith in the durability of Moscow and the Soviet government to rally her people.
Mark Donskoi: The Rainbow (1944)
Description: Rainbow depicts life in a Nazi-occupied village at the beginning of World War II. The Germans are above nothing, not even the slaughter of small children, to break the spirit of their Soviet captives. In this scene we see the confrontation of sisters representing opposites of Soviet womanhood: Pusya, who has betrayed her soldier-husband for the German commandant; and Olga, the village school teacher, who is aiding the partisans in their fight.