Anna Karinina

[deliasherman]

As you know, dears, I don't go to the movies much.  It's not that I don't like them, it's just that I like other things better, and (despite a game effort) it's not feasible to live all possible lives at the same time.  Still, we occasionally indulge when it looks as if a movie's going to be significantly better on a large screen than a small one

Comments

[mizkit]

Ah! I am glad you liked it more than I did. I *loved* the staging, the outrageous costuming, all of that, absolutely loved it, and I thought Jude Law was mind-bogglingly good as the husband. But I felt no chemistry at all between Anna and Veronsky, which sort of blew that storyline for me. :)

[deliasherman]

I can see how that would be. I thought they had chemistry, especially in the country scenes. Perhaps I was just giving them the benefit of the doubt. Or assuming that it's there because I consider Keira Knightley ontologically chemistry-free. Doesn't matter, though. Jude Law was AWESOME.

[mizkit]

The *real* reason their chemistry failed for me, I suspect, is because the dance scene? Was filmed exactly the same way in (the same director's) Pride & Prejudice, also starring Kiera Knightly. I mean, there wasn't the jealousy/breaking heart thing going on in P&P, but the other dancers fading away? Exactly what he did in P&P. And while I thought it was wonderfully effective in P&P, I was like, "...really? He's doing it again? *Seriously*?" in AK, and so all the emotional charge that was supposed to bring just fell absolutely, utterly flat for me.

Disappointing, because I liked *so much* about the film, and I would have loved to have been swept away by the romance too.

I might buy it anyway, just to watch Jude Law's heart break whenever I like. ;)

[gaedhal]

Yes, it's beautiful, but any version of "Karenina" where virtually everyone
fees sorry for Karenin so much more than Anna is a major failure of
focus!

[deliasherman]

For you (and many others). I kind of liked this reading of the characters, which (for me, anyway) allowed all the characters full humanity. Nobody was a saint; nobody was a devil--they were flawed human beings, who made bad decisions and did the best they could. At various points of the movie, I felt sorry for every character.

[deliasherman]

This is the good thing about not seeing many movies (or, clearly, remembering the ones I have seen). I didn't remember he'd done the "world goes away" thing before. But then, I didn't much like what I think of as Emily Bronte's Pride & Prejudice. Too much Romance, not enough Society. For my taste.

I did like the fact that the Bennet girls were making their clothes on the dining room table, though. And Mrs. Bennet's girlhood sacque dress gown she wore to the Netherfield ball. That was some fine sociological thinking things through.