Lee Eisenberg I should start by saying that I've never read Leo Tolstoy's epic novel (and it sounds like a challenge to read, considering how long it is). Nonetheless, Sergey Bondarchuk's adaptation thereof has to be seen to be believed. Lasting almost seven hours, "Voyna i mir" ("War and Peace" in English) is a lot to take in but leaves the viewer feeling fulfilled. The whole sequence showing the Battle of Borodino has to be one of the most impressive things ever filmed. The movie became the first Russian-language movie ever to win Best Foreign Language Film at the Academy Awards.All in all, one fine movie. Having watched this version, I doubt that I'll be impressed by any other version.

p-seed-889-188469 I have seen two and a half movie adaptations of War and peace - this 1966 one directed by Sergei Bondarchuk, the 2007 mini-series version, and half of the 1956 version directed by King Vidor. The first dilemma as a reviewer is on what basis to review it – as a faithful adaptation of an icon of world literature that literary academia has fawned over and prostrated itself to for its place in the evolution of the novel, or as an enjoyable movie for the average viewer. Since I haven't read the book any comment I could make on the former is presumptuous. As an average viewer I would summarize this movie is a spectacular academic success and a spectacular general audience failure. Unless you have read the book, or seen a more compressible movie version, you will have absolutely no idea what is happening in this version. Perhaps this is forgivable for its intended Russian audience who presumably can quote from it chapter and verse, but for the uninitiated it makes for a very long movie. Even if you do know the "story", while the canvas of the Napoleonic Wars is epic, to be brutally honest,the human detail Tolstoy paints against this backdrop is pretty appalling, involving the petty tribulations of a cast of two dimensional cut-out characters drawn from a privileged aristocratic society that is hard to care about. No doubt the characters, and the way in which they are presented, were both accurate and cutting edge in their day, but that day is long gone. The factual material of war is brilliantly and expensively presented, which is fascinating if you want to watch a historical movie. The fictional material of the individual characters is, by modern standards, cringe-worthy. Natasha is an overwrought, vacuous airhead. Pierre is a lumbering buffoon. Andre is, well, who really cares? This would still be true if the actors had been perfectly cast but regrettably the roles of Natasha and Pierre are hopelessly miscast. Why any man would be infatuated by this Natasha is beyond my imagination, she has no inner or outer beauty, and like most of the rest of the characters is an over-emoting cartoon. True, this is difficult to avoid given the flaws of the novel, but other movie versions show that Natasha can at least be mildly interesting and beautiful, if not the dazzling, magnetic personality the plot of the novel requires her to be. In this respect I have to say that far and away the best Natasha of the three I have seen is Audrey Hepburn – she has the charisma, beauty and poise to pull this off and frankly the screenplay she is given is far better than this version. Similarly, Henry Fonda is far and away the most believable Pierre of the three – while he may not be exactly the person Tolstoy intended he is the person who makes the story actually work. Who can actually believe for a second that the dour and dull Pierre of this 1966 version cavorts with a band of gay, devil may care, young Russian military officers, drinks bottles of rum on window sills and ties policemen to bears – please, give me a break. Although regrettably I did not see all of the King Vidor version it seems to me to be the one that in its way is truest to what Tolstoy might have been trying to say. Its screenplay is intelligent, it goes to great pains to make the story and the relationships clear, and although I have really no idea what Tolstoy was trying to say in War and Peace, this, of all the versions tries hardest to give it meaning and provide a third dimension to its characters. The "meaning" of the 2007 version seemed to be "and they all lived happily ever after". The meaning of this 1966 version seems to be "when a bunch of bad guys unite to do bad things, then a group of good guys should get together to stop them". Well, fair enough, but not exactly world shattering, and a poor take away from sitting through 8 hours of dubious footage. I presume there are about 800 pages of the novel that none of these versions attempted to reproduce on film, and I can only presume that the "meat" and meaning of the novel were in those 800 pages. All 3 versions show the events of epiphanies of both Andre and Pierre that indicate that something deep and meaningful is revealed, but none of them communicate with any clarity to the audience what they are. Therefore we are left with a list of set pieces that must be ticked off – Officer on the windowsill drinking rum? Check. Duel scene? Check. Ball scene? Check? Pierre being an idiot at Borodino? Check? Napoleon saying "That is a beautiful death" Check. Wolf hunt? Check. Andre's father at his lathe? Check. But what does it all mean? In summary, there is no doubt that this movie is an achievement and one can always admire an achievement even if one doesn't enjoy it. The battle scenes are models of their kind and spectacular, but what they add to the pace and meaning of the story I don't know. Horses dash this way in the foreground while other horses dash that way in the background. Interesting and expensive but ultimately so what? Are we given any background to the Napoleonic Wars? No. Were the battle scenes accurate or just a lot of noise and fury? Who knows? I suspect that most of the flaws of the movie are simply replications of the flaws of the novel and while fidelity to the novel may be laudable perhaps some concessions to recognize those flaws and make the movie more relevant to modern viewers made have been a better choice. You should probably see this movie for what it is, an epic, an achievement and a monument to a great director.

Polanski_Fan Having read the novel and seen the full version just now, in one sitting, in a theater (Film Forum in NYC), it is an incomparable experience and one of the two or three best novel-adaptations ever made. The cinematography and set-pieces are phenomenal (the budget was $700 million) and the story of course is one of history's greats.Some stuff from the novel gets cut, and the "war" scenes are far more memorable than the "peace" parts, but the entire "Part Two," which focuses entirely on Natalie, would be a great romantic film entirely to itself.In short, it is like "The Leopard," "Gone with the Wind," Abel Ganz' "Napoleon," and "Spartacus" rolled into one masterpiece. However, I don't know that one could sit through this on DVD. But if you don't live in NY this week, I don't know when else you will have the chance to see it on the big screen, where it really is jaw-dropping.

aerovian This is not a commentary on the actual movie, but on the RUSCICO DVD release for North America. I don't know if there have been different releases and updates, but the disks we rented had a 2000 copyright on them, if that means anything. Anyway, the sound mixing on these DVD's was absolutely horrible. The levels often yo-yo-ed up and down; when the scene cut to a battlefield panorama, the orchestral track would thunder so loudly that I didn't know which would blow out first -- my eardrums or my speakers. When it was time for dialog, the volume would usually drop to something barely audible. Occasionally, the orchestra and Foley-work would stay loud while the dialog was superimposed at a much lesser level. My wife and I found that the only way we could watch this movie at all from these DVD's was if one of us kept a hand on the remote to continuously modulate the volume. And, like another user has already commented, when we selected English audio the dialog kept switching back and forth between Russian and English; and occasionally when the characters spoke in French on the native track the dubbing was in Russian, so you're SOL if you understand neither. Ultimately, we gave up watching after the first disk. Before you fork out $50+ for this movie on DVD for your own library, I'd heartily recommend getting your hands on a rental copy to see whether you can really enjoy this epic flick when burdened by such bad sound, particularly if you've never read the book and really want to understand the storyline.