not the master's best

Rating: Null/10 (16 February 2002)

This is one of those very flawed great films. It's structure is like that other "epic love story," "Titanic." Like "Titanic," it's told in flashback by a character to someone he is trying to convince. And, like "Titanic," the teller can not possibly know most of what he's "telling." Rose was not privy to the meeting in which the architect tells the captain the ship's going to sink or Jack's poker game or Cal's conversations with his bodyguard and the sailors, etc., but we see these anyway, as though she were a witness to it all, when she couldn't possibly have been. Yevgraf couldn't have known about Lara's life before she met Yuri or the particulars of Yuri's trip across Russia or of the others he shares the box car with or of his life once he gets to the Gromeko house or of Yuri's ordeal at the hands of the White Russians, etc., but we see these anyway, as though he were a witness to it all.
The second-biggest problem is Zhivago himself -- this guy is a wimp! He is so passive, you can't believe he found the nerve to approach a publisher. The Bolsheviks take over his house, he loses his post and is "reclassified," he and his family are forced to move across country, his poems are banned, and he doesn't bitch once! The only time he shows any backbone is when he throws Komarovsky out of Lara's flat, which comes out of absolutely nowhere.
The third-biggest problem is the casting. Sharif is too exotic to pass for someone from Zhivago's part of Russia, and Julie Christie is too mature to pass for a girl of 17. Tom Courtenay, like Leonardo DiCaprio in "Titanic," seems, at times, young enough to be Lara's child instead of her fiancée. However, Guinness is perfect as always, and Steiger is so wonderfully creepy, it's hard to watch him.
Aside from it being way too long and "Lara's Theme" being played ad nauseam: Why is Komarovsky addressed as "Monsieur" when he's obviously not French? What happened to Lara and Strelnikov's daughter? Why does Komarovsky keep coming to Lara/Zhivago's rescue, even saving their lives at one point? This is critical because we're told he later abandons their child in a the middle of a riot. And, why does everyone speak with a British accent? I HATE that.