Joe Wright returns to his roots with another period piece, this time adapting the Russian classic novel, Anna Karenina. Set during the late 19th century Russia high-society, Anna Karenina, the wife of a very important diplomat, enters into an affair with a Calvary man, Count Vronsky. The most impressive aspect of Joe Wright's adaption of Anna Karenina is the visual design and style he brings to the film. Visually much of the film is presented in this elaborate stage play like atmosphere, where large sets encompass the actors, creating this interesting space which lives between stage and cinema. While this decision could be distracting to some, Wright uses this approach wonderfully to tell the story of Anna Karenina visually as this staged effect elicits the mood of the proper society in which Anna is ultimately trapped. As she slowly breaks away from this society with Count Vronsky, we notice that visual landscapes becomes more free, with no caged in stages. Besides this quite brilliant decision, the film uses a nice amount of style to capture Anna Karenina's soul, expressing her emotions through visual means such as expressionistic lighting, well-designed compositions, etc. We really do get this sense that Anna Karenina is a tragic character, whose emotionally ravaged by the pressures of societies scorn. As you can probably tell I don't really have anything negative to say about the visual design of the film, but unfortunately some of the story structure hurts the film from being truly emotionally devastating. I really believe that Anna Kareinina is a film that could have been 20 minutes longer. The budding romance between Anna and Count Vronsky feels very rushed and could have used more time to develop, especially considering how important this relationship is to the story. This also leads to Anna coming off as foolish or just plain stupid a few times and while I was very happy that the film didn't demonize her husband, Aleksei Karenin, it probably shouldn't have made me flat out root for him at times either. Overall, Anna Karenina is a mixed bag, with the visual aspect being the sure highlight and while I think the film could have spent more time developing the characters and the primary relationship, the visuals made me still invested from start to finish. 7.75/10
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorLove of all things cinema brought me here. Archives
June 2023
|