The movie tries to portray all the suffering and pain that a civil war brings. At times the emotions are high, especially in after-battle scenes. The director tries to focus on both parties (maybe with a a little left-party bias).. Overall the movie succeeds in creating an engaging atmosphere although some scenes seem a bit rushed and unclear (towards the end).Definitely worth watching,

While not bad an effort, by Greek cinema standards, I would expect a more deep approach from Voulgaris, who has a great legacy. Keeping an equal distance from both the Democratic Army of Greece (former EAM members who had shed their blood en masse fighting against the Nazis and their local collaborators) and the National Army (guided by British and American imperialists) is a distortion of history. Equating the victim with the perpetrator (the partisans had been persecuted, murdered and imprisoned by the thousands for two years before the start of the Civil War) is an insult to those people. At least, it is the only Greek movie, so far, that demonstrates some of the atrocities the Americans committed (napalm bombs etc) to support the monarchofascists.

There were some brilliant scenes in the movie, especially some of the scenes when the two brothers meet and the scene in the snow and the tent. Really captured the pain of a civil war.As Guns and Roses say: what's so civil about war anyway?My biggest gripe about the film was that it seemed to paint the communist guerrillas in much more favorable light than they deserved. Americans come across as the nasty guys. Very stereotype. Anyone wonder what Greece would have been like if the Soviets did come to the guerrilla's rescue (as some of the characters long)?A film worth watching.

Given the seriousness of the subject-matter about a period that has left an indelible mark in Greek history and bearing Pantelis Voulgaris's strong directorial credentials in mind, it's astonishing to come across a movie as shallow as this. The main plot about two brothers fighting in opposite sides in Greek Civil War is contrived and unconvincing, and when the movie loses its footing it simply resorts to lyricism flatly deploring the effects of civil war. Psyhi Vathia, in its inability to decide what it wants to be or how it should say what it wants to say, loses any real interest in politics as well and it is finally reduced to a rather naive statement of patriotism depriving the audience of a thorough and credible insight at the machinations that brought this war. A few good battle scenes and beautiful woods cinematography do not save the day.