Anna Karenina

Name: Anna Karenina
Genre: Drama
Released: November 16, 2012
Duration: 129 min
Rating: 63
Cast: Aaron Johnson, Jude Law, Keira Knightley, Matthew Macfadyen

2012

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Generally favorable reviews based on 41 Critic Reviews

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USER SCORE

Generally favorable reviews based on 157 Ratings

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6.4	User Score Generally favorable reviews based on 157 Ratings

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Anna Karenina

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Movie Details & Credits

Focus Features | Release Date: November 16, 2012 | R

Starring: Aaron Johnson, Jude Law, Keira Knightley, Matthew Macfadyen

Summary: The story unfolds in its original late-19th-century Russia high-society setting and powerfully explores the capacity for love that surges through the human heart, from the passion between adulterers to the bond between a mother and her children. As Anna questions her happiness, change comes to her family, friends, and community. (Focus Features)

Director: Joe Wright

Genre(s): Drama

Rating: R

Runtime: 129 min

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Critic Reviews

100

Ann Hornaday

Nov 15, 2012

While Wright's self-conscious theatricality and dollhouse aesthetic conjure comparisons to Baz Luhrmann and Wes Anderson, he outstrips both those filmmakers in moral seriousness and maturity. Read full review

IndieWire Eric Kohn

Nov 15, 2012

Wright's extraordinary long takes draw you into the universe of Anna Karenina with a seamless approach that a straightforward literary adaptation could never accomplish. Read full review

Connie Ogle

Nov 29, 2012

Wright's film is visually stimulating to be sure, but he never loses sight of the raw human emotions that make Anna Karenina a classic. Read full review

Lisa Schwarzbaum

Nov 14, 2012

In making the radical artistic choice to tell the story as if it were being enacted by players on a stage, Wright falls passionately in love with his own fanciful artifices. Read full review

Michael Phillips

Nov 15, 2012

At its most frantic the cutting and staging here veers perilously close to Baz Luhrmann "Moulin Rouge!" territory for comfort. ... I'd rather have seen Wright's carefully elaborated production on a stage, instead of in a movie partly on a stage. Read full review

The Guardian Peter Bradshaw

Sep 9, 2012

The Wright/Stoppard Anna Karenina is not a total success, but it's a bold and creative response to the novel. Read full review

Mick LaSalle

Nov 15, 2012

You know there is something seriously wrong with Anna Karenina when you start rooting for the train. Read full review

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User Reviews

Harmiclir

Nov 22, 2012

Keira Knightley and Jude Law are extraordinary. Wright's unique and beautifully conceived version of the film, using Tom Stoppard's intelligent adaptation, struck me as perfect for rendering the depth and complexity of the story. The "artifice" of the setting, design and art direction areKeira Knightley and Jude Law are extraordinary. Wright's unique and beautifully conceived version of the film, using Tom Stoppard's intelligent adaptation, struck me as perfect for rendering the depth and complexity of the story. The "artifice" of the setting, design and art direction are brought forth with sensitivity and satisfying wholeness. Highly, highly recommended for adults who want to participate in the construction of a wonderful film and story.… Expand

3 of 5 users found this helpful32

RobertBrogan

Sep 27, 2015

Anna Karenina is a great story, and this is an adaptation that gets better each time you see it. At first, it can be a bit confusing, because it is like a musical piece that one has to hear more than once to get the feel of; but a good amount of feeling does go into the film. Kiera KnightlyAnna Karenina is a great story, and this is an adaptation that gets better each time you see it. At first, it can be a bit confusing, because it is like a musical piece that one has to hear more than once to get the feel of; but a good amount of feeling does go into the film. Kiera Knightly plays a very sympathetic Anna: natural, and not exactly naive, but at the same time does not really know what she is doing as she is pulled about by her "demon". The film looks great and the stage-play motif is brought off magnificently with vital creative spirit. The main downside of the film is that Count Vronsky does not come off as someone worth ruining oneself over (though perhaps others will think different). On the other hand, the scenes between Anna and her husband (played by Jude Law) have very good dramatic tension and draw the film through each act. All-in-all, Anna Karenina is a good film with rewatch value. This is a commercial production, but a very creative and interesting one. My rating is a touch on the high side (relative to what one should expect), but it suits some of my tastes, and I personally enjoyed this film quite a bit.… Expand

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

root_

Dec 5, 2014

Keira Knightley and Jude Law gave some stellar performances . I don't know how much Joe Wright gave justice to Leo Tolstoy's epic novel .
I enjoyed the movie up to some extent keeping in mind that it has mixed reviews irrespective of the fact that I'm haven't read the novel itself.
TheKeira Knightley and Jude Law gave some stellar performances . I don't know how much Joe Wright gave justice to Leo Tolstoy's epic novel .
I enjoyed the movie up to some extent keeping in mind that it has mixed reviews irrespective of the fact that I'm haven't read the novel itself.
The dollhouse version of screenplay was enjoyable , Tolstoy's was very lengthy and in parts so it was tough to get the right emotions in just 2 hours .
Jude Law as Count Alexei Alexandrovich Karenin was some extraordinary character a true inspiration a true man .… Expand

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

lasttimeisaw

Feb 15, 2014

It’s the third time for Jon Wright to tender Keira Knightley a leading role in a period drama, the first two (PRIDE & PREJUDICE 2005, 8/10; ATONEMENT 2007, 9/10) have raked in handsome rewards, but woefully the third time is not a charm, a plain and simple reason is that Knightley’s screenIt’s the third time for Jon Wright to tender Keira Knightley a leading role in a period drama, the first two (PRIDE & PREJUDICE 2005, 8/10; ATONEMENT 2007, 9/10) have raked in handsome rewards, but woefully the third time is not a charm, a plain and simple reason is that Knightley’s screen reputation is a far cry from Anna Karenina, Tolstoy’s prime epitome of a Russian belle, a married woman with a modernism perspective, who is enchanted by her dauntless quest of passion and dare to break out of the shackles of a dead-water marriage, yet consequentially, entrapped by her capricious psyche and finally corroded by the society’s scorn and her overestimated perseverance of standing her ground.

However, the film is a high-caliber colossus of mise en scène, deluxe costumes and outstanding art direction, particularly during the first act, its tableaux-on-stage suppleness can effortlessly dazzle the audience and preserve a spellbinding momentum while multifarious characters emerge and disappear, honing up to the climax, the resplendent ballroom sequences, introducing the lust-exuding pas de deux between Anna and Vronsky (Taylor-Johnson), concurrently, the subplot of Kitty (Vikander) and Levin (Gleeson) has been practically rolled out as well.

Next, here comes the predestined adultery, which is fueled by the laborious emphasis on the enticement of the (not so inadvertent) eye contact, soon appears to be an over-contrived obligation to fornication other than following what your heart wants and the chemistry is purely physical, Anna and Vronsky should be soul-mate right? But here in this film, it is a Hollywood aggrandizement of a skinny beauty shagging a hot youngster who beams with pretended profundity (Taylor-Johnson was only 21, and not masculine enough to take on the role). So the magical momentum slumps, fortunately a little compensation is availed by Jude Law, whose version of Karenin is redolent of compassionate forbearance, elicits a free pardon to dissolve any blame generates from his side, occupies the moral higher ground, which skews our emotional pendulum and undermines Anna’s character-building as an anachronistic woman who tragedy is mostly accredit to the time she is in instead of her own defect in making poor decisions.

An involuntarily pouting Keira Knightley, treads the same water in THE DUCHESS (2008, 7/10), no wonder the aesthetic fatigue surges, so she can nail Jane Austen’s Elizabeth Bennet, but not Anna Karenina, she is not that versatile as an actress. With Anna hogging the spotlight, the rest of the cast seldom has any chance to enrich their roles, Macfadyen (Knightley’s Mr. Darcy in PRIDE & PREJUDICE) plays her luscious brother Oblonsky, adequately amps up some farcical digressions; as a mirrored romance between the rejected and the neglected (contrasts Anna and Vronsky’s passion play), Gleeson and Vikander imbue the film with a modicum of subtlety but the wayward editing fail to make their story more engaging.

So this adaption is a musically lyric venture for Joe Wright fans, it has its marked imperfections (thanks a lot, English is not my native tongue, otherwise I would find it is hard to take a Russian literature with mixed accents seriously), but the redundancy of his grandiose aesthetics, suggests Wright is a man knows what is his strongest suit, I can envisage him a successful comeback if only he can acquire some apposite fodder to prepare, maybe it will be his next project PAN, the origin story of Peter Pan, a wonderland backstory may fall right into his froufrou niche, meanwhile hire a new casting director is more contingent now.… Expand

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

ClariseSamuels

Mar 17, 2013

Anna Karenina is a powerful story of marital duty and obligation versus lustful passion and the pursuit of personal, if not egomaniacal, happiness. It is a popular theme. Every time I went to the video store to rent it, every single copy was out, even though the allotted shelf space was thatAnna Karenina is a powerful story of marital duty and obligation versus lustful passion and the pursuit of personal, if not egomaniacal, happiness. It is a popular theme. Every time I went to the video store to rent it, every single copy was out, even though the allotted shelf space was that which is usually reserved for blockbusters. When I finally procured a copy that had just been returned one minute earlier, I told the clerk that I heard the film was produced as though it was a stage play. He replied, “Yes, but it has more energy than that, although it's a little loosey-goosey.” I didn't have time to ask him what “loosey-goosey” meant, but I later looked it up and it means “relaxed, not tense.” I'm not sure that term is applicable. The stagey pretensions seem to actually make this version of Tolstoy's story stiffer and more formal rather than relaxed, especially in scenes where actors are frozen in place or where actors walk to the edge of the stage to hit their mark. I think maybe the clerk thought that loosey-goosey meant something more like looney-gooney or daffy-waffy, because this Anna Karenina is a little crazy. Tolstoy's Anna Karenina was a serious, mature, and intelligent woman, who may have been emotionally distraught about her situation, but she wasn't crazy even though she did commit suicide, but that was a surprise ending. The theater stage backdrop is done par excellence but it is often distracting, and the film works better in the scenes where the theater backdrop is not visible. Just when you think the director dropped the ruse, the footlights, rafters, ladders, ropes and pulleys are back. The actors are almost perfect--Keira Knightley is an exquisite Anna Karenina; Jude Law is a stern and forbidding Karenin; Alicia Vikander is an angelic Kitty; Domhnall Gleeson is a suffering, brooding, and faithful Levin; and Matthew Macfadyen is a hard-working and perfectly bourgeois aristocrat, civil servant, and family man. And then we have Count Vronsky, whose seductive powers are the pivot upon which this story has to rotate, but unfortunately, the director took some liberties that are a little shocking. When the producers of the Bond franchise decided to bet on a blonde Bond, they won. But a blonde Vronsky? Tolstoy's Vronsky had dark hair--he was handsome, elegant, perhaps angry, pondering, and tormented. If he was a bon vivant, it was not that evident. His fickleness and his vices were not an obvious aspect of his demeanor. You had to get to know him to find out that he was an untrustworthy cad, a scoundrel, a louse, and a worm. On the surface, he was a gentleman. Aaron Taylor-Johnson is a good actor who played John Lennon a while back, but his rendering of Vronsky is a boyish, fun-loving rake, perhaps even a mama's boy, whose carefree attitude causes damage of which he is blissfully unaware. This Vronsky should not have turned the head of the virtuous, lofty, and married Anna Karenina. Also, the movie fails to portray the depth of the grief and despair that Vronsky caused Kitty when he visibly lost interest in her after one dance with Anna Karenina, nor does it do justice to Levin's inner torment when Kitty rejects him because she believes that Vronsky is about to propose to her. On the other hand, the portrayal of Anna's neurotic behavior may go a little too far in making her out to be mentally ill. I don't think Anna's behavior was meant to portray mental illness as much as it was meant to portray the consequences of Vronsky's amoral behavior (symbolized by him riding his beloved horse too hard and then having to shoot it), the inevitable outcome of an affair based mostly on physical attraction, and the destructive power of social ostracization. The stage-set theatricality is artistically pleasing, but it burdens the film, causing it to be drawn out in slow motion, making for a long and tedious decline of this noble and tragic literary heroine.… Expand

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TheWalrus2000

Mar 12, 2013

It doesn't have the same feel as many of the other Joe Wright films, which is really disappointing. It follows the messy path of an imperfect adaptation focusing more on visuals than a smooth moving plot. Compared to must or all of Wright's films, Anna Karenina is a mess.

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

oblique15

Sep 3, 2013

This was just unwatchable for me. Took me 15 minutes before giving up on this play/movie.Not many movies I don`t finish, but this one is added to the list. It`s was all over the place. Maybe they wanted an award for most ridicules movie.

1 of 2 users found this helpful11

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