Guerre et Paix

I read Tolstoy's WAR AND PEACE when I was fifteen, and over the years I've read it so many times that the characters are almost like friends and family. And I have to say that on the whole this BBC adaptation was exciting, romantic, and great fun to watch!

Lily James is perfect as Natasha Rostov. She excels at capturing all the moods of a young girl's coming of age, from giddy excitement to tearful despair to frank curiosity about men and sex. The thing about Natasha is that she has to be as natural and exuberant in a fabulous ballgown surrounded by glittering aristocrats as she is in a log cabin making merry among the Russian peasants. That's a lot to take on and Lily James manages it all perfectly. Bravo!

James Norton and Jessie Buckley are both tremendously impressive as the Bolkonsky siblings, Andrey and his sister Marya. Both of them capture how deeply spiritual their characters are, in very different ways. Prince Andrey's search for meaning leads him to a near death experience on the battlefield, but his spiritual longings come across clearly even when is acting the part of a haughty aristocrat. Jessie Buckley's longing for her father's love is beautifully expressed, as is her devotion to Christian love in general. In the book Tolstoy suggests that Princess Marya's goal is simply "to love men as Christ loved men" and that quality is evident in every scene she plays.

I had a lot of trouble accepting Paul Dano as Pierre Bezukhov. So much of Pierre's stature in the novel comes from . . . well, from his stature. He's described over and over as being tall, broad shouldered, clumsy, too big to fit indoors, moving like a big bear. His childlike qualities, his kindness and trusting nature, are balanced out by a gigantic and often menacing physical presence.

Now, Paul Dano gets the childish side of Pierre perfectly, but in the darker moments there's definitely something missing. Even when he's a prisoner of the French he comes across more like Billy Pilgrim in SLAUGHTERHOUSE FIVE than like the Pierre of the book, who is looked upon by both prisoners and guards as a natural leader. I think there's a tendency today to downplay brute male strength as a positive asset, and Paul Dano's casting is symptomatic of a kind of bizarre politically correct form of censorship. But after all, this is a very multi- faceted character, and Paul D. certainly does capture Pierre's gentleness and kindness.

I don't want this to be a ten page review, so I just want to say that the rest of the very large cast is absolutely extraordinary. While Andrey, Pierre, Natasha and Marya are so complex that no actor could really capture them completely, there are dozens of lesser characters who actually come more to life in this mini-series than they do in the book itself. I just want to mention very briefly the following performances:

Tom Burke as Dolohov and Thomas Arnold as Denisov . . . these two characters are like book-ends, the good guy soldier and the bad guy soldier. And the two Toms nail them perfectly!

Aisling Loftus as Sonya was a true revelation. Reading the book as a kid, I always felt like Tolstoy had it in for Sonya. She's the poor relation who always gets left out in the cold, and Tolstoy does a lot of victim-blaming to rationalize how the system works. But Aisling Loftus gives Sonya a depth, strength, and courage that's actually better than what's in the book!

Greta Scacchi and Adrian Edmondson as Countess Rostov her husband Count Rostov. So much of the magic of WAR AND PEACE comes from the sense of family warmth and happiness in the Rostov home. These two actors really make you understand why Nikolay and his sister Natasha are so much loved and so at home in the world, because they grew up with the most loving parents imaginable! Even their flaws are endearing and totally believable.

Tuppence Middleton and Callum Turner really make an impression as the evil, deadly siblings, Helene and Anatole Kuragin. The two of them are like a perfectly matched pair of dragons, or a couple of deliciously deadly vampires set down among the unsuspecting nobility! But the actors find something sad and almost desperate about both of them, keeping them real and capturing the humanity of Tolstoy's vision even with characters he painted in very broad strokes.

The highest compliment you can pay to this production is that the great characters are represented in (almost) all their complexity, and that there are minor characters who are more real here than they were on the printed page. What a fabulous achievement for the writer, the director, the fabulous cast and the BBC!

After Anna Karenina, I was looking forward to War and Peace being more epic and heart rending. And I have not been disappointed so far. The story line seems a little bit rushed at times, but this was a truly mammoth story and Andrew Davies has a reputation for making fine series out of monumental classics.

So far there is rather more peace than war, but the three central characters, Pierre, Prince Andrei and Natasha seem remarkably well cast and the eternal triangle is forming in a complex way, as expected. The series does not feel terribly Russian but clearly the culture and problems that existed at the time were peculiar to continental Europe. Napoleon was terrorising all of Europe and like many before and after him, thought that Russia would fall under his spell. Its therefore no wonder that characters like Prince Andrei found the military a perfect vehicle for their ambitions and patriotism. But the war was clearly going to decimate many of the leading members of Russian society.

Tolstoy's ability to tell a complex love story is already showing through, and the lesser characters like Prince Vassily, Andrei;s sister Marya and Jim Broadbent's wonderful cameo as Andrei's father make this first rate entertainment.

My only complaint would be that there is not more of this spellbinding story.

Mary Gumsley

Andrew Davies' latest BBC production, War & Peace, is an absolutely splendid TV adaptation of the epic novel.

First things first: do not compare a six hour adaptation to the book. Of course there can not be the same level of detail either in character development or plot. This adaptation should be taken on its own merits.

In my option, the outstanding components of this version are:

1. Paul Dano is well suited as Pierre, particularly in his well- practised range (from meek and mild to a raging temper) as seen in, to name one example, There Will Be Blood.

2. The cinematography is stunning. There are beautiful close-ups of couples dancing, for instance, sprawling vistas and an impressive symmetry to various shots.

3. The score is impressive in its variation and poignancy.

4. The costumes are, as you would expect, incredible.

I'm looking forward to seeing the remaining three episodes!

The negative comments here, which I read after watching the miniseries, led me to two things: First, re-read the book, which I hadn't done in ages. Second, I re-watched the Bondarchuk version, which I'd seen way back then when it was first theatrically released. I have to say that all I remembered was simply its length and the scope of the war scenes as it had been widely impressed on viewers at the time that the Soviet army had actually re-enacted them with the blessing of the Soviet state, a propaganda coup in those Cold War times. Yet I seem to remember it as a bit of a bore.

Frankly, people, those who are so negative about this miniseries seem to have watched something else altogether different or need go back and reread the book (if they ever did) and rewatch the Bondarchuk version (ditto). Unlike their claims, it's so happens that the miniseries is actually quite close to the book and a very honorable rendition of Tolstoy's work. Certainly, it doesn't portray Tolstoy's lengthy disquisitions on history and so on, obviously because they are not cinematographic. As to casting, people seem to forget that Bondarchuk, then in his forties, cast himself in the role of Pierre-and he didn't happen to be a very good actor, to boot! Fonda was clearly badly cast, but so was Bondarchuk with the aggravating circumstances that in his case it comes across as a vanity thing. This round goes to Dano, who is an excellent actor and way closer in age to the character.

The other role that seems to have particularly grated on people is Natasha. But in Bondarchuk's film, the role went to a ballet dancer, with no acting experience except for the artificial miming required in the 19th century classic ballets. And this shows bigly, as she plays Natasha as though she were dancing the role! As a former dancer who has also been trained in acting, I can vouch for the differences between the two performance genres and how an unpondered transfer of techniques used in one don't necessarily transfer well to the other. Watching her enact Natasha is excruciating as her gesturing, posturing, and body movement, very obviously coming from ballet miming conventions, are quite artificial and stilted. She simply looks like she strayed into the series from a performance of Swan Lake. Lily James is a perfectly good actress and this round goes to her as well.

All in all, while I can't speak of all the versions out there since I've only seen Hepburn's, Bondarchuk's, and this miniseries, I think this the best of what I know. And I appreciate it greatly for its cohesiveness, faithfulness to the original, excellent production values, acting, and overall quality.

I have read some of the reviews, and seen previous versions so looked forward to this with both hope and trepidation. I loved Anthony Hopkins in the 70s as Pierre, Sergay Bondachuk in the Russian version and Henry Fonda earlier than that. The character is one of my all time favourites, so it took me a while to take to Paul Dano, but once I had, I found it to be a sensitive performance that had its own merits, and deserves praise. Jim Broadbent, Ade Edmondson and the rest of the cast also make it worthy of your time.

All I can say is enjoy the show, lap up the scenery, wallow in the wonderful characters and costumes, charge in your minds eye to battle and dance at the balls. Visit Old St Petersburg without leaving your armchair and be entertained. The book has too much to ever do justice to, (unless perhaps Peter Jackson took it under his wing).