Beautiful Piece Of Art!

Rating: 9/10 (25 January 2014)

Doctor Zhivago is one of the last true epics to ever be filmed. This film came during a time period where there were hardly any special effects and where films mainly use humans/real-life characters to tell the narrative. This wonderful film is a sweeping, majestic beauty that tells a love story amidst one of the most famous historical revolutions of modern times; the Russian Revolution of 1917. Boasting an excellent score by Maurice Jarre as well as amazing, sweeping cinematography, Doctor Zhivago is a film that everyone should watch because this is how you make a film.
David Lean's historical epic, set during the Russian Revolution, is essentially a love story between an army doctor who was drafted named Zhivago and a beautiful, young girl named Lara.
This film has plenty of stars and it consistently relies on human power to tell this story and does so effectively. Omar Sharif does an excellent job in the title role and you like his character because he is sentimental to a fault and in general tries to be the best man he can be. Julie Christie is marvelous as Lara. Alec Guinness, while not shown much is effective in his role as Zhivago's half-brother. Rod Steiger also does a very good job in his role. Finally, I noticed that Charlie Chaplin's daughter is in this film and she does a pretty decent job.
Overall, this is a majestic film that will be sure to knock you off your feet. However, this film is not perfect. The film is at a very time-consuming 200 minutes and sometimes I felt the story may have dragged on a bit. I also had an issue with the very last scene and it does not work well in the large context of the story and it seemed rushed. Other than that, this is a work of art and one that should be shown in film classes for the rest of eternity. I rate this film 9/10.