A classic, epic film from the 60s that I've been meaning to watch for 15 years or so. Never wanted to commit the 195 minutes until I caught the first five minutes on cable. Alec Guinness sucked me in. Even then, I had to watch over three sittings.
I'll try to keep the plot recap brief, as any attempt to get into detail will lead to 5000+ words. The main plot starts with Yuri Zhivago (Omar Sharif), a young orphan taken in by an uncle (I think). He grows up to become a poet and doctor around the time of World War I and the Russian Revolution. While betrothed to the woman he was raised with, Tonya (Charlie Chaplin's daughter), he is entranced when he briefly sees the beautiful Lara (Julie Christie). Lara's a young woman caught in an affair with a mean, domineering man, Komarovsky (he's important later). Lara shoots him at a Christmas party and Zhivago treats the man. Years later, Lara and Zhivago meet on the war front. They spend considerable time working in a hospital together and fall in love, but both are married with a child, so nothing happens.
Zhivago returns to Moscow to find his family's possessions and home seized by the new government. Zhivago discovers he has a half-brother in the new police force, Yevgraf (Guinness). Yevgraf convinces Zhivago and his family to leave Moscow. Turns out Zhivago's poetry is too personal and the new ruling party is all about the collective. The family travels to where Zhivago's uncle has a remote palace to find that even that has been seized. Luckily, there's a guest/worker house that was not seized, so they settle to live there.
Turns out their new home is close to where Lara lives, so Zhivago travels to her and starts an affair. He tries to end it while his wife is pregnant, but he's commissioned into the army before he can return home, abandoning his family at the threat of death. After serving for years, he finally goes AWOL and returns to find his wife and uncle gone. Lara remains and he discovers from her that his family moved to France for safety. Re-enter Komarovsky, who appears to tell both Lara and Zhivago they are in danger. They dismiss Komarovsky and move from Lara's apt. to the uncle's palace, feeling if their time is up they'll spend it together. Komarovsky comes back and finally convinces Zhivago that Lara will be killed if she doesn't leave. Zhivago gets Lara to leave, but stays behind. I guess his heart is tied to Russia.
Dammit, that got out of control quickly.
This is an example of great filmmaking. I'm not technical enough to tell you why. I just love it. Great cinematography. Great feel for the right amount of dialog, which isn't much. Very little exposition. The narration isn't a bother. In fact, I like the way it's used. When the narrator (Guinness) appears in the story, instead of duplicating his speaking, they have him just narrate and exclude his dialog. It's a good variation.
It helps to have Julie Christie, an incredibly beautiful woman in her 20s. There's a good chance my film teacher in college had a crush on her. We only watched 6 movies, two of which starred Christie. One was Don't Look Now, which is awesome for the nudity, except you must also endure Donal Sutherland's penis. Sometimes sacrifices must be made.
I used to relish watching epic movies, thinking of it a test of will. Maybe I'm just old, but I think they knew what to do with 3 hours 30 years ago. Today, they just use it to shove in 30 more minutes of pointless fighting and needlessly confusing plot twists. It's mostly Spielberg's fault.
It's pretty amazing when you think about it. Dr. Zhivago has essentially no plot. It's a character study, a long one, and still a million times more interesting than anything of comparable time produced in the last 15 years.
Only one real complaint. Questionable musical score. Too upbeat in places I feel should be dour.
After the movie, I realized I have no concept of what Rod Steiger looks like. He plays Komarovsky, which I found out from IMDB. This is the 4th movie I've seen with Steiger where I couldn't actually tell it was Steiger. Something about his face is impermanently pressed into my mind.
First Viewing: 3+3+3+2+3 = 14