Guerra e Paz

Bondarchuk brings Tolstoy's enormous literary work to the screen with all the scope and pomposity that the Soviet film industry could muster in the sixties. It's a long, two-part movie that tries to give moviegoers as much of an experience as readers often get from the novel. It's generally successful in a clinical way. The production design and set pieces are delivered on a massive scale, with battle scenes that are basically re-enactments of history. There's enough creative casting to make most of the characters come alive, although much of the drama is wooden and stagey (just as in the book, I might add). All in all, this is probably the biggest visual spectacle ever put on film, even in the age of CGI (a fact which only makes the viewer more appreciative of the logistics involved in setting up a production as big as this). A colossal epic that gives true meaning to the term "years in the making with a cast of thousands!". Image/Rusico is presenting a definitive DVD version in the Sovscope widescreen ratio with the original 70mm six-track magoptical sound on four discs. That's around 7 hours of subtitles for those inclined to see this spectacle in it's purest form.

War and Peace, to many, is synonymous with a colossus of a book. The ultimate door-stopper. It is among the most complex and epic works of literature ever written. In 19th century Moscow and St-Petersburg, youths grow, make their mistakes… hearts are bound and then broken… and then the great war against Napoleon tears all these lives apart. Leo Tolstoy created intimate portrayals, compelling characters and epic action, telling the story of an entire country and an entire era effortlessly and elegantly. So if books are often difficult to adapt, this one should be completely impossible (witness the shallow King Vidor adaptation).

This film is the stuff of legends. Reportedly one of the most expensive productions ever created, Sergei Bondarchuk's "War and Peace" benefited from the Red Army's involvement and the Soviet Government's financing, and clocks in at about 7 hours. It is as faithful to its source as could be imaginable. In fact, it almost transcends its source.

Admirably cast (the angelic Liudmila Savelieva is ideal as Natasha Rostova and the director was unbelievably wise in casting himself as Pierre Besukhov), elegantly transcribed into a witty screenplay and enacted with class and conviction by its immense cast, "War and Peace" is not just a good adaptation. Its merits as a film are colossal. The cinematography defies any other film, particularly during the battle scenes: rejecting the painterly staticism of Barry Lyndon and the simple charging and distant shots of older films, the violence in Sergei Bondarchuk's epic mirrors that of Kingdom of Heaven (2005!!!), as the camera flies over a never-ending battlefield at full speed, glides aver frantic canons and divisions, crashes into mêlées and follows haunting stampedes of riderless horsemen (a potent metaphor for how the great leaders of the time lost all control over the conflict's proportions). All this without a pixel of CGI in sight (and all the better for it as it presents shots that the eye would simply refuse to believe if generated by a computer) The epic battle of before the sack of Moscow is so colossal and devastating, that even Napoleon looks confused at how to feel before the ocean of corpses sprawled before him. This is the greatest display of cinematic warfare ever committed to the screen. That the calmer scenes manage to sustain that level of excellence is a testament to how grandiose an effort this film is. The display of repressed emotions and overt tenderness are heart-breaking and many episodic scenes stand out magnificently, such as the wolf hunt, the opening balls (easily rivaling anything in "Il Gattopardo") and the duel. This is a film to which the fantastic "Dr Zhivago" feels like a small appetizer… Bondarchuk's "War and Peace" reaches beyond the book and in doing so successfully is one of the greatest motion pictures of all time. It is cinematic poetry and entertainment of the highest order. And to sum things up in an overused – but never more appropriate than here – they'll never make'em like this again.

This is one real grand old fashioned epic movie, in basically every way imaginable. But how many people have actually ever heard or watched this movie? Surprisingly not nearly as much as it's deserving. It of course also has to do with the fact that this movie was made at the time of the cold war, so this movie wasn't largely viewed or available in the West. And of course its extreme long running time is also an element that prevents lots of people from watching this.

Yes, you can view the movie in parts, since each part of the movie forms a new different 'chapter' (Chapter I: Andrey Bolkonskiy, chapter II: Natasha Rostova, chapter III: 1812 god, chapter IV: Pierre Bezukhov) of the story, focusing on another character, in either war or peace but its of course best and most effective to watch this movie as one whole. After all the chapters and characters are of course all connected. There are a couple of characters that appear- and connect the 4 stories. The chapter themselves also aren't at all times chronological with each other and its rather 4 different tellings and different point-of-views, each of them providing more in depth of the story and characters. Each chapter has of course its own qualities and some are more appealing than others for certain people. And even though the movie its running time is over 7 hours, it still is a movie that moves along just fine. Despite not having the most fast pace, it never drags.

It's especially the contrast between the war and peace situations that makes the movie so epic and powerful in what it tries to achieve. Each chapter focuses on a different either war or peace situation. I think Tolstoy himself would had been pleased with this adaption of his novel.

It's probably one of the, if not the, most expensive movie ever made but that's hard to really say because of the inflation. So it can't be really said how much this movie cost to make with today's money. The movie not in the least also was so expensive because it took years to make it. It was good to see that they didn't just only put all in the money in the battle sequences of the movie but also obviously in the overall look of the movie. The movie features some amazing large detailed sets and good, detailed, authentic looking costumes. But it of course are still the battle sequences that will impress the most. It will blow your mind. Ten-thousands of extra's were used during the big battle sequences. I keep saying this but it's always more impressive to see an extreme number of real humans charging than it is to watch a grand CGI-battle, no matter how realistic and impressive it all looks.

What I also liked during the battles was that it in parts used the same style as '20's and '30's Russian genre movies, in its camera-work and style of editing mostly. No doubt an homage to the good old golden days of Russian cinema. But the movie overall also uses a great and unique unusual style at times. It uses lots of tricks in parts, such as split-screens and extreme fast editing, to often give the movie an unique and sort of surreal feeling. The movie would often also feature some extreme long shots, in which the camera moves all the way through the ballrooms or other rooms in the palaces or over the battlefield.

The acting in the movie is also surprisingly great, as far as I'm able to judge that. I mean it's also hard to really judge the acting quality in a movie in a language that you don't speak or understand for yourself. Seemed to me that most of the actors in this movie are normally stage actors, which was a good and suiting acting style for this, of course sort of overblown, movie. The movie of course features a whole lot of characters but they all get the right required treatment and are deepened out. The long running time of course allowed this all to be possible. No way this movie would had worked out as good as it was just 'merely' a 3 hour epic.

I think the fact that the movie won an Oscar for best foreign film, despite of the cold war at the time, shows how brilliant the movie is.

10/10

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Do not watch the US video release, it's a disgrace; a bit like cutting off a bird's wings and forcing it to bark like a dog. The original is breathless in scope and profoundly moving - it is in four parts and runs close to seven hours, and there are good reasons for its length as any can guess who have read the book. If only someone had the conviction and decency to prevent this kind of mangling. I wonder how Tolstoy would have felt if they had told him 'War and Peace', the 'US version', would only be published as cliffnotes.

The best film ever made, ESPECIALLY when taking into account all the logistics - the Soviet Government as a film studio?? (sort of makes sense, after you picture Leonid Brezhnev as Louis B. Mayer), and the world's most infamous LONG novel turned into a megamotion picture.

It probably hasn't been seen in the US on a broad scale since ABC had the good sense to run it as a four part late-night special in early 1973 (anyone else remember)?

Not even subtitles - for those of us who are not true foreign film buffs, I mean - can hurt this film. Bondarchuk's amazing direction, as well as his acting, is breathtaking. The Russian people have been celebrated as lovers of great writing and the subject at hand, "War and Peace", becomes a poem at the conclusion.

Truly magnificent from every level - as a period piece, a psychological drama, a war movie, a love story, a history...Tolstoy would be universally acclaimed ahead of Shakespeare if he (Tolstoy) had the good sense to be from England...

Don't miss it. How the Soviet Government, at the height of the Cold War, could finance and produce a masterpiece like this is one of the great mysteries of the 20th century. Give Bondarchuk the credit.