FILM REVIEW
Review Scoring Chart - 10: Masterpiece; 9: Outstanding; 8: Very Good;
7: Good; 6: Above Average; 5: Average; 4: Below Average; 3: Bad; 2:
Awful; 1: Reprehensible; 0: Non-Functional.
ANNA KARENINA
Dir: Joe Wright
Stars: Keira Knightley, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Jude Law, Domhnall Gleeson
Running Time: 130 mins
[This review was first published on Flixist]
After a run of trying-too-hard Oscarbait pictures, Joe Wright's Hanna looked
like a concerted effort to make a movie for people who didn't work at
the Academy and perhaps went to the cinema to, heaven forfend, be
entertained. Unfortunately, Anna Karenina sees him return to
all his worst habits: a historical adaptation of a classic novel more
concerned with being a showcase for the director than telling a story or
building emotionally complex characters.
In faint recognition of his reputation for directing this kind of movie, Wright sets his interpretation of Karenina
in an abandoned theatre, a gimmick seemingly designed to satirise the
artifice and posturing that have become staples of the period genre.
It's a decent idea, except Wright gets so caught up in it he neglects to
add any depth beneath the dazzling surface.
There's no question that the movie looks gorgeous. Every part of the
theatre is used, from the basement beneath the stage to the catwalks
above it. Beautifully crafted props flow in and out of shot, redefining
the landscape as the camera moves from one area to the next. While much
of this is obviously an in-camera illusion, it's an astonishing feat of
showmanship, turning an auditorium into a snow-covered train station, or
a grand derby with horses charging across the stage. Wright may be
showing off, and certainly isn't subtle about it, but his movie is given
a flair and dynamism uncommon in this stuffiest of genres. It's the
polar opposite of the brutal realism Andrea Arnold brought to her Wuthering Heights, but while Wright's trick is unlikely to work a second time, the cheeky revisionism is no less potent.
The technique makes a thematic connection to Tolstoy's narrative as
well. As much fun as Wright is having in mocking the excessively
choreographed ballroom scenes which have clogged up the genre since time
immemorial, the theatrical setting gives the impression of a gilded
cage to the Russian high society which exiles Anna once news of her
affair breaks, even though her lover is subject to no such
recriminations. To make the point explicit, Levin's story, wherein he
wins the heart of a society girl and takes her for a hard-working but
happy life in the countryside, is shot almost entirely outdoors. The
landscapes are barren and rough compared to the stage's glamourous
interiors, but wide open and free. Whereas Wright's extended tracking
shot across the battle-scarred beaches of Dunkirk in Atonement was a meaningless piece of directorial egotism, Karenina's gimmick is at least appropriate to the novel.
Unfortunately, while Wright engages intelligently with Tolstoy's
themes, he shows no such knack for telling a story or forming any kind
of emotional bond with his characters. Perhaps Tom Stoppard's screenplay
should be commended for condensing an 850-page novel into a two hour
movie while still making sense, but everything feels too rushed and
clinical to allow the material or audience room to breathe. Anna barely
spends more than a few minutes with her son, despite their separation
later being a primary reason for her going mad. Levin's story has a
thematic connection with Anna's, yet little reason to exist in narrative
terms, with the two characters barely sharing a single scene. Anna
surrendering her beliefs to have an affair with Vronsky seems to be told
in a series of checkpoints, rather than allowed to develop naturally:
she's initially repelled by her attraction to him, then isn't, with
little in-between to contextualise why she would be willing to give up
everything to be with this man, other than boredom and perhaps a
fondness for pube moustaches.
The failure of the central romance is in large part down to Aaron
Taylor-Johnson's simpering interpretation of Vronsky. Far from the
passionate, swarthy officer of Tolstoy's conceiving, Taylor-Johnson
minces through the movie with the syrupy expression and posture of a
schoolboy with a testicle caught in his zipper but too embarrassed to do
anything about it. He's no more believable as an experienced womaniser
than as an officer of the Russian army, where any squaddie worth his
helmet would be using this milquetoast goon of a Vronsky as a human
shield.
I seem to be one of the few people who considers Keira Knightley a
perfectly good actress (although better on stage than on screen), but
she never feels a good fit for Anna. Though Knightley is twenty-seven
and Anna married at eighteen, she looks far too young to be a mother.
The numbers may add up, but there's something which doesn't sit right
about watching it in practice. Furthermore, Knightley's interpretation
of madness still involves little more than jutting out her jaw and
scruffing her hair a bit, which doesn't lend much gravitas to her
character's downfall. She has some well-handled moments and is better at
wordlessly communicating feelings and inner turmoil than she used to
be, but it's a struggle to stay interested in a love story when both
leads are miscast. It's an uphill battle for her, as no-one could share
chemistry with the mesmerisingly awful Taylor-Johnson, but the kindest
summation of her performance is that she gives a brave attempt but never
really stood a chance.
The supporting cast are significantly better, with Matthew Macfadyen
easily stealing each of his scenes as charismatic socialite Oblonsky.
Jude Law lends a quiet, intense dignity to Anna's wronged husband,
Alexei, who suffers greatly for his crime of being tremendously dull.
(The whole situation might have been averted if only he'd learnt a few
knock-knock jokes and read Fifty Shades Of Grey). Levin is
given a strong inner honesty by Domhnall Gleeson, completely out of
place in the backstabbing high society world, and Ruth Wilson, Olivia
Williams and Emily Watson make for a marvellous trio of bitchskis.
Sadly, for all the strong work done on the periphery, the many
storytelling failings doom the movie to appearing every bit as shallow
as the social snobs it so condemns. Once the novelty of the staging
wears thin, and even Wright seems to tire of it near the end,
there's nothing left to hold interest. Despite endless talk of love,
the exaggerated (literal) theatricality forces a disconnect between the
characters and audience. While Law, Macfadyen and Gleeson give powerful
enough performances to win sympathy back, Knightley and Taylor-Johnson
are too stiff and out of place for their doomed affair to feel anything
other than dishonest and bereft of feeling.
Tolstoy famously had little time for the stage, and Wright's
adaptation perhaps shows why. A deep, passionate novel is reduced to a
series of beautiful but forced encounters, while the vast scope of its
story cannot help but feel reduced and enclosed by the theatrical
framing device. The props are elaborate and stunningly put together, but
it's a shame Wright put so much effort into them that his main
characters feel like they've been lifted off the shelf at Ikea. [ 4 ]
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