petarmatic There are only two films which I could say that they portray war in Sarajevo in an excellent manner. One is The Perfect Circle (1997), probably the best one, and the other one is this one. There are many other films made about war in Bosnia, but I do not agree that they come even close to these two.It is a pity that this film did not make it to the wider audiences (it was shown only in the North America). This way I invite distributors to show this film to the European audiences, especially in the former Yugoslavia.Europe is full of the geopolitical rifts and former Yugoslavia was full of them. Some of them do not materialize into war like for example Catalonia, others do like Ukraine.This film tried to put a human face on what was happening in Sarajevo during the war. It certainly did a great job! If you want to know what was happening during the war in Bosnia between 1992 and 1995 this a film to watch. Excellent work by all means!

David I first watched this when it aired on UK TV in the late 90s. Luckily I videoed it and have watched it many times since.While I totally agree with what other reviewers have said about omitting the complex events leading up to the war at the risk of offensively over-simplifying a complex and impassioned tinder box, we must also appreciate that a movie simply cannot be all things to all people. So while a movie about the historical and political backdrop to the war would be a very worthy undertaking, that would have to be a separate movie to this. Trying to shoe-horn all of that into this story would've been a disaster and I doubt it would ever have made it to the screen. Besides, you should never go to the movies expecting a history lesson. Even when they try to shoot a faithful real-life account, by the end of the too-many-cooks process, it ends up at best 50% accurate. That's just the nature of the beast and it's naive to expect any different.So, misplaced accuracy-based judgements aside, we have here the simple story of 2 friends whose ethnic backgrounds lands them on opposing sides of a war. The very thing that cemented their friendship - their skill as target shooters - becomes a curse as they find themselves inevitably recruited as snipers on the front lines. Justification for the war and personal well-being wrestles with loyalty to old friends.I found the interaction between the 2 central characters very touching and credible. It sets the scene nicely for the nightmare scenario they're confronted with later in the story.The zeitgeist conjured up both pre and post conflict work very well for me, though of course I cannot comment on how accurate a reflection of reality this is - it just comes pretty close to what I imagine and what footage I saw of Yugoslavia during this time.They did a good job of depicting civilian normality suddenly violated by some sacrilegious military intrusion, whether it be an exploding shell in the night or a sniper's round to an old lady fetching water. As well as illustrating the insidious and deliberate intent to terrorise innocent civilians in order to break the will of their leaders, I think this sudden and violent change in mood is as much as you can do to describe the start of a conflict like that on screen.Linus Roache and Vincent Perez were great in the lead roles, along with strong support from the doctor, wives, and girlfriend. The locations were extremely well-picked out. I appreciate some of it was actually shot in Sarajevo - a bold move only 5 years after the events depicted.I guess my sole criticism would be the apparent ease with which Slavko seemed to transform from warm-hearted friend of the family into a cold killing machine. It just seemed a little devoid of soul-searching or intense emotions I'd expect to see a man go through faced with that kind of dilemma. That said, I've never been in that situation so perhaps I am naive - perhaps that's roughly what would happen in a situation like that where the only way one could proceed is to over-compensate and brutally reject what came before. So the jury's out on that one.Other than that nit-picking, I thought this very sensitive subject was handled with the appropriate amount of respect while still telling the gripping dramatic story at its core. Furthermore, it manages to make some very striking points about what's so unacceptably wrong about warfare inflicted upon a civilian population, whatever the perceived justification may be.The central story is an unusual and intriguing one in its own right which is justification enough to bring this to the screen. Transcending that though, I think this film helped shock a largely ignorant UK audience into re-educating themselves a little more about a conflict they never really understood in the first place.

ejk5019 You guys are missing the point, honestly, UNIFORMS, incorrect use of a mosin M-44? Who cares, it's the message that counts. Maybe I have to apologize for having a life outside of looking up little discrepancies in movies, but I try to take the movie for what it's worth rather than pick it apart. It was an HBO movie, yes, it's going to be in English! Get used to it, most movies are written in the language of the intended country of release. It's a message that goes back to the US civil war but brought up into modern times. It was a well made movie with good acting and an exciting screenplay. I was thuroughly entertained while at the same time being forced to know that the back-story was taken directly out of real life. Great movie (period)

George Parker "Shot Through the Heart" is an even tempered, dogged, austere production of people caught in the rift in Sarajevo during the Bosnia war. The film focuses on two long time friends, both expert competitive marksmen, who find themselves as snipers on opposite sides of the conflict. Not unlike other "friend against friend" civil war stories (eg: Gettysburg), the two men are on a collision course with the ultimate showdown. A well managed drama which imparts some sense of the strife in the splintering of Yugoslavia while telling its story of families and friends divided, "Shot..." is a worthy film making effort.