From Russia With Love

"Anna Karenina"

Director Joe Wright and actress Keira Knightley have a fantastic working relationship.  Anna Karenina is the duo's third collaboration together, Pride and Prejudice and Atonement being the former two.  If there are two things that Wright does well as a filmmaker, it's putting together spectacular, poignant period pieces and also getting consistently solid performances out of his leading lady.  I don't think much of Knightley outside of costumed dramas but when she works with Wright, the result is rather pleasing.  I haven't seen any of the other many film/television adaptations of the famed Leo Tolstoy novel.  I know that the 1100 page piece of literature is supposed to be this great romantic masterpiece which is why I was so surprised to see the runtime of this Anna Karenina was a puny 130 minutes in length.  I’m sure how much of the lengthy novel's plot/characters were either condensed or done away with all together, I think what remains though is satisfying despite whatever gripes fans of the novel may have over screenwriter Tom Stoppard's and Wright's adaptation.  In fact I believe it's the choices that these two men have made when putting together this mediocre love story that helps this film become a welcome addition to the dramatic period piece genre.

The time is 1874.  The place is Russia.  Anna (Knightley) is unhappily married to Count Alexei Karenin (Jude Law.)  Oh what is a high society aristocrat like her to do?  Why have an affair with the considerably younger Count Vronsky (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) of course.  Vronsky and Anna are madly in love with each other and may the consequences of their lustful passion be damned.  When Anna breaks the news to her husband, Karenin decides that instead of divorcing her, he will make her life completely miserable.  Not only is Anna forbidden to see Vronsky but she while is out and about in public, society gives her the cold shoulder; poor, poor Anna.  Is what Anna and Vronsky have true love or is her lover looking at their relationship as just a fling?

There's a jaunty sort of pace to the film.  Anna Karenina has the feel and quality of something that could have been directed by David Lean, except that Wright's injected his picture with steroids.  The pace is brisk.  We are quickly introduced to a bunch of characters at the beginning of the show which I thought was a bit overwhelming at first.  Who are these characters and how are they all related to each other?  I at least was able to figure out and understand who most of the players were in the show.  The characters aren't necessarily thinly drawn, I just wasn't exactly swept up the great romance that was unfolding on screen.  What was there I thought was good, but not anything especially absorbing.

I did like how this conventional love story was told though.  We open on a stage and the actors start to assemble for the start of the show.  I thought this was going to be a film not a play.  Well actually it's a bit of both, which ends up being a beautiful marriage between the two mediums of entertainment.  Wright starts with the actors on a stage, then seamlessly transitions the theatrical set and the actors to a cinematic set, and finally finishing the scene back to a stage set.  It sounds jarring or perhaps unnecessary, but I felt that these carefully choreographed sequences of camera movement and set changing played an important role in the film.  Wright's choice of breaking the norm of what we usually see from a period drama came off as quite refreshing.  It's no easy task to have lots of actors and set pieces moving all about in one continuous take.  I commend the collaborative effort that Wright and director of photography Seamus McGarvey put forth in bring this adaptation of Anna Karenina to the screen.

Anna Karenina boasts meticulously decorated and detailed sets, opulently designed costumes, and elegant photography making it a film worth seeing on the big screen.  Accompanying its aesthetics is a cast where everyone gives decently respectable performances, especially Ms. Knightley.  Although the love story is somewhat standard there's certainly enough pop and pizzazz from Wright's direction to make this picture somewhat above average.  I want Wright and Knightley to continue to work together even if it is only for period pieces.  There's obviously a certain of level of trust they have in each and can rely on time and time again.  I'm not saying that every period drama should look Anna Karenina or needs to appeal to a younger audience. However, to breathe new life into a genre that for a modern day movie going crowd would usually  come off as stuffy, dry, and boring, I tip my ushanka to Mr. Wright.