Dr Zhivago

[poliphilo]

 I didn't care for Dr Zhivago when it first came out; I thought it slow to the point of dreariness and distinctly old fashioned. Also emotionally detached.  Fifty years on (and more) slow has become meditative, old-fashioned has become timeless- and emotional detachment no longer seems such a bad thing. 

In fact I can't see much wrong with it. The performances are great. I'd loved to have seen James Mason as Komarovsky (he turned it down) which isn't to say that Rod Steiger isn't more than adequate. Chaplin is sweet, Sharif is soulful, Christie does a wonderful job of turning a dream girl into something real, Guinness is miscast but has his moments and Richardson is a joy. Klaus Kinski puts in a characteristic appearance being dangerous and mad. Russia (actually Spain and Finland and other far-flung places) looks beautiful.

I don't suppose there's any doubt now that Lean is one of the great directors. 
 
I read the book around the time I saw the movie- in a cheap paperback edition with Sharif and Christie and a steam train on the cover- and found it a slog- an attempt to do something Tolstoyan by a writer who wasn't really a novelist. The cheerleaders of the west wanted it to be an enduring classic because it was a wet fish to slap the Soviets with- but I doubt they were right.  Do people still read it? I suppose it's of historic interest and importance. Am I going to re-read it? No. But I'd happily watch the film again.

Comments

[cmcmck]

It reminded me of Sholokhov's work and I think I prefer that, even though it is very definitely Soviet.

[poliphilo]

I never read Sholokov...

[cmcmck]

'And Quiet Flows the Don' repays an attentive read.

[athenais]

I doubt very much whether people still read the novel. It was never a classic at any time, just one of those things "everyone" read. Can't imagine anyone reading it now. The film, though, has the actors to enjoy. So I'm sure it still has an audience that's occasionally under age 50.

[poliphilo]

I caught it on TV on a Sunday afternoon. It's the sort of movie a family might sit down and watch together- perhaps.

[sovay]

In fact I can't see much wrong with it. The performances are great.

I mostly bounced off Dr. Zhivago the first time I saw it because I'd enjoyed how much the novel was about poetry where the film seemed to be so much more about romance; on rewatch I was able to see that it was still about poetry. I don't find Guinness miscast at all—he stole the film for me from the start and still does in memory; he's one of those actors who never gives anything away and neither does Yevgraf Zhivago, who is neither boasting nor apologizing when he says that he's executed better men than himself with a small pistol. I suspect the film was also my introduction to Tom Courtenay, with his idealistic student's spectacles that become those small clear steel-cold blinkers of the Soviet world. I agree with you that Christie is impressive. She doesn't come off as a fantasy.

[poliphilo]

That's a great line about the "small pistol". If it had been a large, heavy pistol it wouldn't have been the same thing at all.

Maybe I should rethink my assessment of Guinness's performance. He is, after all, one of my favourite actors.