Ночные Ласточки

This Russian series is about a group of Soviet women pilots who flew night harassment flights against the German Army during World War Two. This is episode one of the 8 episode series.

During WW2, the Soviet Air force used female pilots to man obsolete PO-2 biplane trainers. These aircraft were first produced in 1928 and could only carry about 600 pounds of light bombs. They flew low level night time missions that were effective at depriving German troops of sleep etc. The German called the pilots "Night Witches". The Germans soon had their own version of these night harassment squadrons.

In this episode, we are introduced to the pilots of the Soviet squadron. There is all the usual Soviet types here, the brave commander, the disgraced officer, the understanding man in charge of the women and of course the swine of a NKVD officer.

The women carry out several pinpoint bombing missions for the Soviet intelligence service. These missions are of course spot on and the Germans are really put out. The story as a whole is rather far-fetched, but the cgi effects and camera work is quite good. The Germans are all shown are mindless buffoons, making you wonder how they ever managed to advance into the USSR at all.