Joke about 17 moments of spring ? OK...Beer garden in Germany... There is a queue on the bar stand: Mueller, Shellenberg, Iceman... Shtirlitz runs into the bar, and instead of lining up behind Iceman, he stands before Mueller and gets his beer from under his nose.Mueller: What's up Shtirlitz ? There's a line there. Shtirlits: Soviet Union Heroes (a State award and title in the Soviet Union) are served out of turn !!! (a rule existed in Soviet Union, a privilege to the people honored with high State awards)Another...Shtirlitz wakes up after a good beer party with a hangover and tries to remember who he actually is ? An obergruppenfuehrer SS Shtirlitz or Russian spy Isaev ? The door opens and a doctor comes in: "Good time you had yesterday, comrade Tikhonov (the actual family name of the actor)".

Soviet films about WWII may be tedious, long or pathetic, but not this one, which is done by the great filmmaker Tatiana Lioznova and since she is a woman the movie has that deep, thoughtful, sweetly painful feeling of heroism, tragedy and bravery. Sure, some things are exaggerated and of course there could never be such an ideal spy as Stirlitz, played here by awesome Vyacheslav Tikhonov. What is very important here is to show what crafty and smart enemy as Nazi were we managed to win over at a cost of 30,000,000 lives. The film is about people who stay human in the fire of war, and about humans who become beasts and cruel monsters. This is the fine example of a great war movie without propaganda or sickly patriotism.

This series are far greater than anything that has been filmed about war ever. It shows closely characters of German Nazi top during the last weeks of the war, when they understand that the war is lost. A Russian spy is working among them speeding up the war's end.The pace of the film is slow and thorough, the movie is meant for people with ability to analyze, reflect. Characters of the people involved are depicted are so lively that the film fuses with the documentary pieces. Acting is extremely raw and natural, it actually in't acting, it's living. Tihonov in a role of Stirlitz portrays a real spy - brilliantly talented, sharp, calm, cold, patient - everything that areal spy has to be. At the same time he is not a greedy adventurous coat-turner, he works for his country, his people, his family. And the last - this film works as a litmus test on people. If you don't understand it you simply haven't matured for it. The film itself is flawless.

If anyone would like to see a good TV Series he/she must see "17 moments of the Spring", where Viacheslav Tikhonov played wonderfully the role of the Soviet agent Stirlitz. In fact, this agent never existed, but he was like a compilation of those soviet agents (Kuznetsov, Sorge and others) who died fighting nazi occupation in the territories of former USSR. Leonid Bronevoi also played in excellent way the role of nazi officer Heinrich Mueller. The story of the series was like the one of cat vs mouse. Mueller always suspected of Tikhonov, but could prove nothing.The soundtrack of the series is also melodic and easy to listen.