Rating: 
Summary: Bondarchuk's "War and Peace" released by RUSCICO
Review: A gargantuan version of Tolstoy's national epic, approached as a priority as important as the Soviet space program, War and Peace is surely the biggest production ever put on film, with entire armies filling the screen and covering vast landscapes. The recreation of the Napoleonic era in St. Petersburg and Moscow is a wonderment. Director Sergei Bondarchuk makes the story work even better at the intimate level. The romantic adventures and heartbreaks of the story's central trio, Pierre, Natasha and Andrei lead to at least 4 or 5 devastatingly emotional highpoints.
Previously, there was the 1956 Dino DeLaurentiis version. Except for some awkward casting, it wasn't half bad, but it pales beside the opulence and scope of this colossus. Ruscico's version is both longer and better-presented than previous releases, and Image has packaged it with helpful extras and easily-navigated menus. More on that below.
Savant was excited to see this pricey-but-exceptional DVD release; Ruscico has a reputation for quality releases of hard-to-see Soviet pictures, and War and Peace is certainly the prize title, at least for Western audiences unfamiliar with the majority of Mosfilm's output. I saw the American release when 16 years old, serialized over two weeks in a fancy theater in San Bernardino. I can't say I followed the story well, and mostly remember the grainy, washed out picture and the distracting English dubbing - Natasha's voice squeaked like Minnie Mouse. But the eye-popping visuals stayed burned into my memory, especially a God's eye view, receding into the heavens, of the Austerlitz battlefield spread out below. It looked as if it took in miles of smoke and fighting.
In Russian with subs in a number of languages, the new Ruscico / Image DVD is a completely different viewing experience. The Russian voices are beautiful, and it's easy to catch cultural things we had only read about, such as the St. Petersburg elite opting to speak French for many conversational details. It's not 70mm, but on a big widescreen television, the scope of the visuals can be almost overwhelming.
Ruscico's DVD of War and Peace is handsomely presented on 4 discs in a thankfully easy-to-understand package. The transfer image isn't going to be able to compete with restorations done here, however. War and Peace was shot in a Soviet color system in 70mm, and the colors are a muted set of pastels we aren't used to. Either the age of the elements, or the reduction printing, or bad storage has given many scenes a dupey look, with slightly fluctuating contrast. The image is stable and intact, but there are occasional scratches and slight damage.
Either that one bad shot was an isolated instance, or most of the time we're too caught up in the story to notice such things. I should point out that I viewed the discs on a 65" monitor that magnifies these kinds of flaws, so many viewers will probably be completely unaware of them.
The DVD producers have included a generous allotment of extras, listed below. A fifth disc contains a couple of Soviet docus on Tolstoy and an elaborate commemorative behind-the-scenes piece. It starts with the stars at a Moscow premiere, and then backtracks to show how many scenes were filmed. The cameraman is on roller skates in the ballroom scene, and a trucking scene through the battlefield shows exactly how some of the more amazing shots were captured. The cameramen use portable 70mm cameras of a kind I've never seen, that look every bit as sophisticated as ours.
In one of the interviews, the President of the Mosfilm studio says that after the years of filming, War and Peace wasn't unanimously praised in the Soviet Union. Everybody saw it, but not everyone thought it was a masterpiece. Audiences are audiences, Russian or American, and after those 4 or 5 transcendant moments in the picture, the ending does seem rather downplayed and anti-climactic. But seeing the show now after 35 more years of film history, this enormous epic seems more of an accomplishment than ever. P.S. To watch the movie preview video clip you can on russianDVD.com website for free.
Rating:
Summary: Brilliant film, now can we have it on DVD?
Review: A masterwork in cinematic breadth and vision which does justice to the Tolstoi novel. Perhaps only the much-hyped Lord of the Rings trilogy may represent an equally faithful a book-to-film conversion. Worthy of seeing just for the battle scenes, though the tape's pan and scan format means that the viewer cannot recapture the cinematic experience properly. No computer simulations, real armies, real actors. In comparison, the Hollywood version with Audrey Hepburn, Mel Ferrer, and Henry Fonda (all seriously miscast) is eminently forgettable. But avoid the original dubbed English version of the Russain masterwork. As part of a massive restoration project of Russian films, a DVD version is in preparation, hopefully with the sound and picture quality in its full glory. Now when are American distributors going to get THIS one!!!
Rating:
Summary: This is what movies should be like!
Review: A wonderful adaptation of Tolstoy's classic! Unarguably the best version of the novel and certainly one of the best films of all time! What makes Tolstoy great is that he combines epic literature with deep phycological insight (something that is almost never done), and the film doesn't miss a beat. Great acting, directing, screenplay, and of course, unbelivable cinematography. Highly recommend it!
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Summary: The best screen adaptation of "War and Peace" ever made
Review: Actually, this movie is a genial picturization of the genial novel.A constellation of characters created by the constellation of character actors and actresses: Sergei Bondarchuk himself as Pierre Bezukhov, Lyudmila Savelieva as Natasha Rostova, Vyacheslav Tikhonov as Andrei Bolkonsky... Misterious Russian soul. You should not miss this movie! I highly recommend other movies by Bondarchuk: "The Man's Destiny", "Father Sergyi", "They Battled for the Motherland".
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Summary: The Wait is Over
Review: After 35 years, finally: the fab issue of THE boffo flick!!
What else can be said?
Rating:
Summary: A surpisingly enjoyable film.
Review: After an unexpected delay, Image Entertainment has finally released the full-version of War and Peace on DVD. And what a collection it is! The entire film is spread out over 4 discs in a serialized fashion with each disc dedicatated solely to a specific portion of the film. Additionally, each disc contains cast biographies, notes on relevant history, architectural drawings, and more. The fifth disc contains lengthy interviews with the production staff as well as original "documentaries" on the making of the film. All in all, an impressive package indeed. So, how is the movie? When I first sat down to watch it my first thought was "What am I doing? A six-hour Russian film that is almost 40 years old? Is this going to be interesting at all?" Surprisingly I found the film to be very engaging and held my interest throughout the 6 hour 43 minute running time. The photography is excellent, the acting is very realistic, and the enormity of the production does bring moments of "Oh my god!" every now and then. (Seeing 50,000 extras in costume while a battle rages is very impressive!) But the film is not for everyone. It does lack the polish of the traditional Hollywood film and the story is sometimes difficult to follow. The director's style would go from melodrama to experimental with multiple images, odd camera angles, and strange compositions. (You can definitely see the influence of Abel Gance's Napoleon.) The battles scenes are the most impressive portions of this film, perhaps of any film to date, and are worth the cost of this disc alone. The quality of the transfer is excellent, despite a flawed film source. The audio is up-to-date with excellent 5.1 sound separation and strong bass for those booming canons. Since the disc is not region encoded (for worldwide distribution) it contains multiple audio streams and an enormous amount of subtitle choices. The English audio & subtitles are flawed. The dubbed version has many scenes that are not dubbed at all and contain only English subtitles. (The liner notes say this version on DVD is the restored version, including originally censored scenes. My guess is that the non-dubbed parts are these restored scenes.) As for the English subtitles, they appear to be accurate but often do not materialize during French speaking scenes. However, since I prefer to watch the film in its original Russian language, the only annoyance I encountered was the sporadic lack of English subtitles. If you have any interest at all in this film, I would strongly recommend this new and definitive release. At 6+ hours, five discs, and a film production that will never be duplicated again, this is a purchase that will not go unappreciated.
Rating: 
Summary: Eccentric Epic
Review: Bondarchuk made War and Peace between 1960-1967 and also did the 1971 film Waterloo. Both films are stand-outs when it comes to re-creations of famous battles. Waterloo is a great military story although Rod Steiger as usual plays Rod Steiger instead of Napolean. Christopher Plummer does a splendid job as Wellington. If you are looking for a military film I would recommend that one over War and Peace. War and Peace is graced by a perfect cast of Russian-speaking actors(no Rod Steigers) who do Tolstoy's characters justice. Bondarchuk himself plays the fumbling but charming Pierre. As an actor I like him and as a director of battle scenes he is nonpareil but as a visual stylist he makes a lot of questionable judgements. Its too bad that he was given that enormous 100 million dollar budget in the sixties instead of the fifties for Tolstoy would have been better served by a more reserved Bondarchuk. Bondarchuk is one of those artists who just can't leave a good thing alone. He has enormous sets and excellent actors and the best source material on earth and yet he finds it necessary to accent his scenes with gaudy visual effects c. 1967. Surprisingly the gaudy effects do not steal too much away from the performances which are excellent. While watching this you will question Bondarchuks choice of style but you will not question his devotion to the material. And thankfully for the most important scenes like Pierre's duel and the debacle at Austerlitz and Napolean's subsequent invasion Bondarchuk adopts an appropriately grave and sober style. I think the film is admirable and unique in that it doesn't water Tolstoy down one bit for entertainments sake. The characters all appear as complex in the movie as they do on the page and at times we feel like the novel has come to life right before our very eyes. I would however say that individual parts are stronger than the whole. I can pick out a dozen scenes that deserve to be praised and should not be missed. Some of Bondarchuks eccentric visuals do take away from the overall impression the film leaves however and so whenever asked about the film I recommend it but with a kind of cautious and qualified praise. If you like the Napoleanic era, are excited by immense battlefield scenes, and you like brooding nineteenth-century Russian literature then this is a must see. A unique film for a select group.
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Summary: Cinematic Greatness Not Destroyed by Poor Quality Kultur DVD
Review: I first saw this film on PBS in the '60s and never forgot it. Still hum the waltz theme from the ball scene. Recently I spotted the Kultur DVD set online, practically dropped dead with excitement, and clicked "purchase" without doing any research.
It never occurred to me that such a poor quality DVD might be for sale (for $40!!) at major online retail outlets. Some of the scenes in Part I are so dark I can barely make out the image. The sound is a bit scratchy too. I started to wonder if this wasn't videoed surreptitiously in a movie theatre.
Apparently the Ruscico version is far superior in quality, if more expensive ($70) and not without its own problems (see other reviews). Also, if you don't own a widescreen TV monitor, you may still prefer this Kultur full-screen version, which avoids the annoying "letterbox" effect -- though of course at the cost of cutting parts of the original image off the screen.
Despite its many defects - if you love cinema, BUY THIS FILM. Even the less than ideal audio and visual quality of the Kultur print cannot mask this film's greatness, its eye-popping scope, its dramatic story, its haunting music and memorable imagery.
And definitely get a version where you can hear the original actors speaking in Russian (with English subtitles). The majesty of the Russian language is central to this film, and you will feel it even if you don't understand a word. (The occasional Russian overdub of French dialogue is a minor annoyance, nothing more.)
If you have read and loved Tolstoy's epic novel, fear not. This film is as faithful to the original as was Peter Jackson's film to Tolkien's trilogy - if not more so (I'm still annoyed that Jackson went for a "Die Hard"-style dispatch of Saruman off Orthanc in Part II, omitting Tolkien's nuanced 'Scouring of the Shire' in Part III.)
A lot of reviewers complain about the "psychedelic 60s" filming techniques Bondarchuk used, but I think they misjudge Bondarchuk's over-the-top directorial style, which seems perfectly in tune with the traditional Russian penchant for emotional excess. This is no dry literal retelling of Tolstoy's narrative arc -- it tries to render, in cinematic terms, an impassioned yet faithful account of the emotions of the participants in this drama. If it misses its goal here and there -- you cannot deny the greatness of the very attempt. (Q: Who else but Bondarchuk would or could have made an oak tree into a central character? A: Tolstoy.)
A lot of reviewers also dismiss the message of the film as Communist-era propaganda, but I'd say again that that is a misreading of the film, which is patriotic and Russophile only insofar as is the original novel. (PS: the Commies didn't invent love of the Russian fatherland.)
Even in its diminished condition (memo to Spielberg: How about financing a proper restoration?), this is one of the single most memorable films you will ever be privileged to see.
Rating: 
Summary: Fascinating, beautiful film, mediocre presentation
Review: I had the opportunity to peruse this Kultur DVD edition of "War and Peace" enough to evaluate its presentation. Firstly, it's not letterboxed, but full-frame. The opening title sequence only is letterboxed to some extent so as not to cut off all the titles, and this looks as though the original aspect ratio is not particularly wide to begin with. So while not a great deal of picture is cut off from the sides, there is some missing. The print is a good one, and the beauty and power of the film come through, but it does not appear to have been restored to any great extent. This means that the color intensity, contrast, and brightness of the image fluctuates from scene to scene, and sometimes even within one scene (reel changes, perhaps?). The image throughout is a bit soft-focus, and it benefits greatly if you turn up the sharpness control on your monitor. There does not seem to be a great deal of blemishes, dirt, or damage, though. The English subtitles are printed on the film itself, and therefore not removable. In the scenes where French is spoken, there is a voice superimposed on the soundtrack translating what is being said into Russian, which is of no interest to the English-speaking viewers who will be watching this DVD. In these cases, you have an actor speaking French, an additional voice speaking Russian, and an English subtitle simultaneously, which is distracting to say the least. It's hard to imagine why a print with this feature was chosen, unless it was the absolute best-looking print available. That brings up the subject of the alternate issue of this film due at the end of December from the Russian Cinema Council (Ruscico). Judging from past Ruscico DVD releases, it may well be a restored, archive-quality print (hopefully letterboxed). Ruscico releases appear at a very slow rate, but when the do they are worth waiting for, which is what you may want to do. The film still makes a stunning impact, even in this less than perfect presentation. If you prefer full-frame presentation, you may even prefer this one. It seems to me, however, that most cinemaphiles whose interests are arcane enough to extend to this film would want it presented in its original aspect ratio, in an edition as close to the source material as possible. Those people may well prefer to see what Ruscico offers.
Rating:
Summary: Intruiging (but flawed)film, excellent DVD.
Review: I have recently watched Bondarchuk's 1968 epic of the 1351 page tome by Tolstoy. The film is indeed a great achievment of cinema, but at 403 minutes, the pace could have been quickened. The acting, particularly by Lyudmilla Savlieva as Natasha and Bondarchuk as Pierre, are excellent. The DVD is among the finest I have ever seen. The image, while occasionally flickery, is often gorgeous, and the sound is possibly the most robust and lifelike soundtrack in ages! The 5th disc of extras (added as an afterthought)are mixed. The doucmentary made in the 1960s is quite good, but the interview with the current president of Mosfilm is dull, and it goes way off track. I have not seen the other interviews. It's too bad this wasn't planned as a SE from the start, as a commentary from some of the participants, or even working from the voluminous archives of Soviet press releases, would have been most welcome. Still, this is indeed the best way to see this film (Why did Kultur bother to plop their muddy pan and scan tape onto a disc unchanged?), and so I give it a hearty recommendation. P.S.: If disturbing music bothers you (it bothers me) skip the credits for Part 3.) -Jamie Teller
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