"Wouldn't it have been lovely if we'd met before?"

Rating: 9/10 (23 September 2017)

DOCTOR ZHIVAGO is an epic romantic war drama film, that shows the events from the World War I and the Russian Civil War through a tragic love story of a poet/doctor. On the other side, it is a dynamic and ruthless change in the social order. These violent changes are perfectly grooved between a personal drama and political conflicts. It is based on the Boris Pasternak novel of the same name.
The film takes place mostly against a backdrop of the pre-World War I years, World War I itself, the Russian Revolution of 1917, and the Russian Civil War. After his mother's death 10-year-old Yuri is sent to live with his family friends and their daughter Tonya in Moscow. His only heirloom is his mother's balalaika. Later, Yuri goes on to study medicine in Moscow and writes poetry. Lara is a student, who lives modestly with his mother and secretly seeing one revolutionary. A ruthless politician Komarovsky, her mother's lover, comes in Lara's life. On the Christmas party where Tonya and Yuri's engagement is announced, Lara shoots and wounds Komarovsky. Their common story can begin...
Major changes in society are differently manifested on small groups. Given the sentiment, emotion and suffering, this fact fully answer to a passionate love affair between a gentle artist and a lost and alienated woman. I think, that a historical revolutionary background is neglected with a good reason. Simply, people forget to love and feel each other for a time of great social changes.
Mr. Lean has processed painful human topics in a gorgeous scenery. He has made a sort of contrast between what people want and what they actually are. The melodrama is exaggerated in some parts of the film, therefore, the main protagonists act a bit confused. It directly reflects on the characterization.
Omar Sharif as Dr. Yuri Andreyevich Zhivago is a gentle and handsome man, who is trapped between his sadness, courage and love. However, it seems that he transfers to the paper his tragic love story, which no one can read. Mr. Sharif has offered an interesting performance. Julie Christie as Lara Antipova is a woman who answers to social stimulants. However, she is confused in love. Her fate is more than ironic.
Their support are Tonya Gromeko (Geraldine Chaplin) as beautiful and vapid Yuri's wife and Victor Ippolitovich Komarovsky (Rod Steiger) as a resourceful and disgusting politician, who well remembers one slap. Mr. Steiger has offered excellent performance.
There are Lieutenant General Yevgraf Andreyevich Zhivago (Alec Guinness) and Pavel "Pasha" Antipov / Strelnikov (Tom Courteney) as two different medals of the revolution.
This is a visual masterpiece with perhaps too Hollywood for a Russian love story at the time of the war and the revolution.