“They rode them down, Lara. Women and children, begging for bread. There will be no more ‘peaceful’ demonstrations.”
David Lean’s DOCTOR ZHIVAGO screens Wednesday October 19th at The Tivoli Theater (6350 Delmar in ‘The Loop’) as the last installment (for now) of their new ‘Classics in the Loop’ film series. The movie starts at 7pm and admission is $7. It will be on The Tivoli’s big screen.
The most successful of David Lean’s films in terms of box office, DOCTOR ZHIVAGO (1965) provides us a picturesque view into the upheaval of the Bolshevik Revolution as well as the lives left in its wake. But unlike other popular Lean films, this one would have us believe it’s a romance about anything else. The political and military conflict serves as the backdrop rather than the driving force of the film. Omar Sharif plays an idealistic doctor/poet orphaned at an early age and we pick up with his story as he is about to begin a general practice in Moscow just before WWI. He is from the upper class yet doesn’t seem politically active and initially doesn’t take a stance either for or against the Bolsheviks. But we know he’s a good man as one night he goes out into the cold and tries to care for some Bolshevik demonstrators who have been run down into the street by a cavalry detachment. We see a kindness in this man when indifference might have been more expected from someone from his class. One Christmas Eve, he witnesses a most beautiful woman walk into a fancy gathering and shoot her lover. The woman, played handsomely by Julie Christie, becomes the object of his desires for the balance of the film.
DOCTOR ZHIVAGOmoves along from one elaborate setting to the next through the span of the next several years. After WWI and the revolution, there is the Russian Civil War to deal with, and one thing after another seems to keep Sharif and Christie apart. So much so, that you wonder where the romance is in this supposed romantic picture. Both are married and have children with other people, and end up sharing little screen time together. One is reminded of the perils of having a romance set during a time of war. DR ZHIVAGO is quite beautiful to look at. It also paints a frightening portrait of life in Russia during these times. Hard to imagine Czarist rule was any less just than Bolshevik rule. The sets look real enough. There are many fine performances. Rod Steiger steals every scene he’s in, even if we don’t often have a clue who’s side he’s on. Look for Klaus Kinski in an earlier role as a rabble-rouser on a train. DOCTOR ZHIVAGO runs 3 hours and 17 minutes but it’s a stimulating and rewarding film experience and I highly recommend heading over to the Tivoli Wednesday night and seeing it there on the big screen.
