Resurrection

Some movies come from long books. Resurrection comes from a long book. Resurrection is some movie.

Since Yevgeni Gabrilovich and Michail Schweitzer prepared a screenplay which sticks to the plot of the novel and happens to run two-and-a-half hours, and since I happen to be the only one I know who has read Tolstoy's novel, a discussion of plot might be in order now. But leave until last the easy stuff that's been around, as Frank Harris used to say. You should see this movie.

It's a Russian film and naturally there's plenty of pseudo-classic montage, dramatic sky and stark, navel-level camera work, but the really exciting footage owes something to the early German directors. Wasn't it Robert Weine who painted the foreboding expressionist shadows on the set of The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari? And Carl Mayer who strapped a camera on Carl Freund, the "drunk" camera man of The Last Laugh?

In Resurrection's opening scene, Schweitzer (also director) mounts his camera on E. Savelyeva, who trundles down hundreds of yards of oppressively black corridors. The swaying field and the sharply subdued tonal range of blacks and dark greys continue for several long minutes. Abruptly, the corridor leads into daylight. The camera becomes stable, the greys turn brilliant white, and like the prisoner whose path we have been following, we are glad to be out of the aggravating dark, but able to adjust only slowly to the new light.

Then there's the de-aging sequence of Katyusha, the heroine, dissolving (like Orson Well's Mrs. Kane) from tough whore to well-bred ten-year-old. And Nekhlvudov, the hero, trudging the paths of a Siberian village--photographed with the flavor of Italian neo-realism. And many other cinematic "quotes" which are appropriate and effective, not the kind of private joke they seem to be with Truffaut and Godard, for example.

Now for that plot: Katyusha emerges from prison for her trial while Prince Nekhlyudov arrives for jury duty. She is falsely charged with theft and murder while he realizes she is the love of his youth--whom he had impregnated, given an unwanted hundred rubles, and deserted. She is unjustly sentenced to four year's hard labor while he becomes obsessed by his guilt. She lives contentedly in jail while he tries everything to get her out. She turns down his offer of marriage while he succeeds in having her pardoned. Finally, she opts for another while he carriages off into Siberian mist.

That's what happens when you summarize Tolstoy in a paragraph. What is important here is evil--when Nekhlyudov stopped listening to his conscience, evil began. So, too, the vices of bureaucrats and the injustices of procedure share Nekhlyudov's guilt for Katyusha's dilemma. But forgiveness is also important: both Katyusha and Nekhlyudov emerge "good people" after their long and torturing period of atonement. Not to mention the people, the imperfect masses Tolstoy cherished.

Yevgeni Matverev (He) is properly bearish, obsessed, and soulful. Tamara Syomina (She) is buxomly beautiful with wonderful eyes. In this grand film, the two are a pleasure to watch.