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Doctor Zhivago |
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Plot Synopsis: Lara inspires lechery in Komarovsky (her mother's lover
who is a master at surviving whoever runs Russia) and can't compete with passion
for the revolution of the man she marries, Pasha. Her true love is Zhivago who
also loves his wife. Lara is the one who inspires poetry. The story is narrated
by Zhivago's half brother Yevgraf, who has made his career in the Soviet Army.
At the beginning of the film he is about to meet a young woman he believes may
be the long lost daughter of Lara and Zhivago.
Source:
Amazon.com |
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_________________
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Doctor Zhivago is a novel by Boris Pasternak, which was also adapted by Robert Bolt into a 1965 epic film. The novel is named after its protagonist, Yuri Zhivago, a medical doctor and
poet. It tells the story of a man torn between two women, set against the
backdrop of the Russian Revolution of 1917.
According to Boxofficemojo.com [1], this is the
8th highest grossing movie of all time with collections of US $794,466,900 almost
surpassing Titanic in adjusted terms.
The Novel
Although it contains passages written in the 1910s and 1920s,
Doctor Zhivago was not completed until 1956. It was submitted for publication to the journal
Novyi mir, but was rejected due to Pasternak's difficult relationship
with the Soviet government. In 1957
publisher Giangiacomo Feltrinelli smuggled the manuscript out of Russia and
published the book in Russian in Milan. The following year, it appeared in Italian and English translations,
and these publications were partly responsible for the fact that the author was
awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1958. The book was finally published back in
Russia in 1988, ironically in the pages of
Novyi mir, although earlier Samizdat editions also exist.
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Zhivago is sensitive and poetic nearly to the point of mysticism. He is distracted by the beauty of ice
crystals on a window pane. In medical school, one of his professors reminds him
that bacteria may be beautiful under the microscope, but do ugly things to
people. Yuri Zhivago's idealism and principles stand in brutal contrast to the
horrors of the Russian Revolution. A large theme of the book is how the
mysticism of things and idealism is destroyed by both the Bolsheviks and the white army. Yuri must witness cannibalism,
dismemberment, and a young man shot dead for wanting to see his family. Even the
love of his life, Lara (sometimes called Larissa), is taken from him. He ponders
on how the war can turn the whole world senseless, and make a previously
reasonable group of people destroy each other with no regard for life. His
journey through Russia has an epic feeling because of his traveling through a
world which is in such striking contrast to himself, relatively uncorrupted by
the violence, and to his desire to find a place away from it all, which drives
him across the arctic Siberia of Russia, and eventually back down to Moscow.
Pasternak's description of the singer Kubarikha in the chapter 'Iced
Rownberries' is virtually identical to how Sofia Satina (sister-in-law/cousin of
Sergei
Rachmaninoff) described Gypsy singer Nadezhda Plevitskaya (1884-1940). Since
Rachmaninoff was a friend of the Pasternak family, and Plevitskaya a friend of
Rachmaninoff, Plevitskaya was probably Pasternak's 'mind image' when he wrote
the chapter; something which also shows how Pasternak had roots in music. Source:
Wikipedia Encyclopedia
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Details
- Actors: Omar
Sharif, Julie
Christie, Geraldine
Chaplin,
- Directors: David
Lean
- Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, Widescreen, Ntsc, Widescreen
Anamorphic
- Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only.
Read more about DVD
formats.)
- Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
- Number of discs: 1
- Rated:
- Studio: Turner Home Ent
- DVD Release Date: November 6, 2001
- Run Time: 197 minutes
- Available Subtitles: English, Spanish, French
- Commentary by: Omar Sharif, Rod Steiger and the director's wife Sandra Lean
(Unknown Format)
- New 2001 digital transfer from refurbished elements
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