Catholic ping!
I find the movie ending deeply troubling, the daughter is told the story by a sympathetic Soviet General (Alec Guiness) who talks about all the progress made by the USSR.
I have not read the book but the movie was not particularly hard on the Bolsheviks. It was tough enough that I am sure it was banned in the Soviet Union.
It really was a great movie tho.
I really enjoy the movie.
My favorite character is Pasha/Strelnikof.
His life is so full of change.
He’s a young revolutionary.
Then, he’s a family man.
Next, he’s a Soldier.
He then becomes a tyrant.
The action that is not seen in the movie, but merely mentioned, is that he abandons all politics and escapes to be with his love, Lara.
It shows that this world is made up of people, not politics.
A beautiful story with great acting and beautiful scenery and excellent camera work.
One of my favorite movies. I would characterize it as a chick flick though. It’s a love story.
Stellar Posy ~ T Y 4 posting...
I was raised Methodist and the experience was a once in a lifetime thing. Getting up every few hours through the night to pray in the chapel and listening to the seemingly endless prayer request lists sent to the Abbey from around the world opened my mind to a different reality.
Our sponsor, a Trappist Brother, Fa. Tarcisius, was a close friend of Thomas Merton and I remember the Catholics in our group were deeply touched to be there.
Aside from the wonderful music, it is a classic because Dr. Zhivago is a timeless story of endurance. Strelnikov assures Yuri “The personal life is dead.” But like the spring flowering after the bitter winter, people come alive again even under the most hostile, suffocating oppression. Yuri’s daughter striding away alongside her mate at the end — life finds a way through. The film began with little Yuri witnessing the burial of his mother.
Yuri’s daughter recalls almost nothing of her parents, yet she plays beautifully on the balalaika that belonged to her father. She is told her ability is a gift; it represents the life force or spirit that persists against all odds.
It all seems random and impersonal. Children are cut down, by mistake. An entire population is decimated by philosophical error. The hero is a physician who can patch, but not cure his fellow man of their spiritual disease. The most feared warrior is a young man whose battles left him mutilated and emasculated; before that he was — a pale intellectual. The cynical opportunist, like a gangrene, temporarily advances and thrives. Evil baffles the wise. There is no sense to it, one endures — or not.
The lyrics of the popular tune “Lara’s Theme” expressed the main theme of the novel: someday we’ll meet again ...whenever the spring breaks through.
Sorry, maybe I am dense . . . or maybe just a prude, but there isn’t any character in the story I like. Certainly, we all have flaws, but what I see as the self-indulgent flaws of these folks, makes them ultimately unlikeable.
I don’t like the “epic lurve story”(glorification of adultery)angle.
I didn’t get the idea that communism was glorified though.
If families hadn’t been split up to serve the effort maybe Lara and Yuri wouldn’t have fallen into such temptation.
The scenes I remember most that spoke to my heart the loudest about communism were pertaining to Yuri’s homecoming and what became of the house he lived in-he and his family reduced to one small room therein-and the food shortages.
Our high school history teacher took the class to see Zhivago in 1966. My Russian anti-communist parents saw it too, and the scene with people packed in the train with straw all round was very much their own history. I later read the book. Both are good and reflect the devastating changes brought on by the revolution. (In the book, Zhivago has not just one mistress, but one or two more)
Also a fabulous BRIDGE player.
My most favorite movie of all time. Have watched it over 15 times since 1965.