BuzzFlash Reviews

BUZZFLASH REVIEWS

A stunning anamorphic widescreen print is the ideal way to appreciate David Lean's craftsmanship and Dr. Zhivago's glorious, wintry cinematography. Maurice Jarre's "Lara's Theme" and the rest of his patchwork score can be heard in a music-only track, while Omar Sharif is joined by Lean's widow, Sandra, and Rod Steiger for an intermittent commentary. The second bonus disc contains a good hourlong making-of documentary, plus 10 shorter contemporary documentaries giving various insights into the location shooting and the cast and crew. But it's the sheer beauty of the picture that will astonish and make this disc forever a treasure.

--Mark Walker

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Synopsis from Rotten Tomatoes:

"David Lean's DOCTOR ZHIVAGO is an exploration of the Russian Revolution as seen from the point of view of the intellectual, introspective title character (Omar Sharif). As the political landscape changes, and the Czarist regime comes to an end, Dr. Zhivago's relationships reflect the political turmoil raging about him. Though he is married, the vagaries of war lead him to begin a love affair with the beautiful Lara (Julie Christie). But he cannot escape the machinations of a band of selfish and cruel characters: General Strelnikov (Tom Courtenay), a Bolshevik General; Komarovsky (Rod Steiger), Lara's former lover; and Yevgraf (Alec Guinness), Zhivago's sinister half-brother. This epic, sweeping romance, told in flashback, captures the lushness of Moscow before the war and the violent social upheaval that followed. The film is based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Boris Pasternak,"

From the Roger Ebert review:

And yet the stage has running water, and the horses look real enough to ride. "Doctor Zhivago," restored and revived for its 30th anniversary, is an example of superb old-style craftsmanship at the service of a soppy romantic vision, and although its portentous historical drama evaporates once you return to the fresh air, watching it can be seductive. Consider, for example, the early shot of the red star glowing above the dark tunnel opening where the workers march in and out. The shot of a child peering through a frosted pane with the claws of branches tapping against it. The cavalry charge on the Bolshevik marchers. Or the way snow crystals dissolve into flowers, and a flower dissolves into Lara's face.

Lean did nothing less than recreate Moscow and its countryside at the time of the Russian revolution, using locations in Spain and Canada (which supplied the vast landscape with the tiny train making its way across it). He accepted the challenge of setting most of the key scenes in winter, with all the attendant difficulties of photographing snow (both artificial and real). There is a moment when Zhivago and Lara enter the abandoned dacha, and the snow and frost have preceded them, turning everything into a winter fairyland. It is a scene where you simultaneously think about the skilled set decoration, and catch your breath at the beauty.

The story is based on Boris Pasternak's novel, much praised on its publication in 1958 as a daring defiance of Russian censorship.

BuzzFlash: One of the last of the grand Hollywood epic films, "Doctor Zhivago," 1965, is a grand testament to the power of cinema to marry a sweeping historical landscape with a tragic romantic drama. It's cinematography and acting are on a grand Hollywood scale.

No, it's not a detailed or history or a revelation of the Russian soul embodied in Pasternak's novel, but it is one of Tinseltown's legendary productions, with one of those oversize orchestrations.

BUZZFLASH REVIEWS