Kerry Condon - News NEWS 25 December 2009 3:12 AM, PST | Filmofilia | See recent Filmofilia news » Take a look at these brand new trailer and poster for the upcoming “ The Last Station ,” a drama about the last year in the life of Russian novelist Leo Tolstoy . “ The Last Station ” synopsis: After almost fifty years of marriage, the Countess Sofya ( Helen Mirren ), Leo Tolstoy ’s ( Christopher Plummer ) devoted wife, passionate lover, muse and secretary?she?s copied out War and Peace six times…by hand!?suddenly finds her entire world turned upside down. In the name of his newly created religion, the great Russian novelist has renounced his noble title, his property and even his family in favor of poverty, vegetarianism and even celibacy. After she’s born him thirteen children!

When Sofya then discovers that Tolstoy’s trusted disciple, Chertkov ( Paul Giamatti )?whom she despises?may have secretly convinced her husband to sign a new will, leaving the rights to his iconic novels to the Russian » - Allan Ford 13 December 2009 11:31 PM, PST | Upcoming-Movies.com | See recent Upcoming-Movies.com news » Movie Jungle has new clips in from Sony Pictures Classics ' Helen Mirren , Christopher Plummer , Paul Giamatti , James McAvoy and Kerry Condon . Michael Hoffman directs from the writing by Jay Parini. After almost fifty years of marriage, the Countess Sofya ( Helen Mirren ), Leo Tolstoy ’s ( Christopher Plummer ) devoted wife, passionate lover, muse and secretary—she’s copied out War and Peace six times…by hand!—suddenly finds her entire world turned upside down. In the name of his newly created religion, the great Russian novelist has renounced his noble title, his property and even his family in favor of poverty, vegetarianism and even celibacy. After she’s born him thirteen children!

When Sofya then discovers that Tolstoy’s trusted disciple, Chertkov ( Paul Giamatti )—whom she despises—may have secretly convinced her husband to sign a new will, leaving the rights to his iconic novels to the Russian people rather than his very own family, » Kerry Condon and James McAvoy in The Last Station Photo: Sony Pictures Classics I haven't read a word of Leo Tolstoy 's novels so some may say I was approaching The Last Station at a disadvantage as it focuses on the final days of Tolstoy's life. Looking even further, I haven't seen any of writer/director Michael Hoffman 's films prior to watching The Last Station , a film that appears to have gained Oscar attention out of a sheer lack of competition. That is to say this is a good film, but hardly worthy of such lofty acclaim as this is little more than a made-for-tv story acted out by some of the feature film world's elite.

James McAvoy stars as Valentin, and make no mistake about it, he is the sole lead of this film as he is introduced to the Tolstoy camp as the famous writer has renounced his noble title, » - Brad Brevet 25 November 2009 10:56 AM, PST | Filmofilia | See recent Filmofilia news » The first trailer for a historical drama that illustrates Russian author Leo Tolstoy ’s struggle to balance fame and wealth with his commitment to a life devoid of material things – “ The Last Station ” has been released. Both written and directed by Michael Hoffman , the movie stars Christopher Plummer , Helen Mirren , James McAvoy , Paul Giamatti and Anne-Marie Duff among others. After almost fifty years of marriage, the Countess Sofya ( Helen Mirren ), Leo Tolstoy ’s ( Christopher Plummer ) devoted wife, passionate lover, muse and secretary, she’s copied out War and Peace six times…by hand! suddenly finds her entire world turned upside down.

In the name of his newly created religion, the great Russian novelist has renounced his noble title, his property and even his family in favor of poverty, vegetarianism and even celibacy. After she’s born him thirteen children! 24 November 2009 9:49 PM, PST | Upcoming-Movies.com | See recent Upcoming-Movies.com news » See the trailer as well as previously added images from Sony Pictures Classics ' " The Last Station ," starring Helen Mirren , Christopher Plummer , Paul Giamatti , James McAvoy and Kerry Condon . Michael Hoffman directs from the writing by Jay Parini . The foreign drama sees release in limited venues on December 4th. Check out the official site at After almost fifty years of marriage, the Countess Sofya ( Helen Mirren ), Leo Tolstoy ’s ( Christopher Plummer ) devoted wife, passionate lover, muse and secretary—she’s copied out War and Peace six times…by hand!—suddenly finds her entire world turned upside down. In the name of his newly created religion, the great Russian novelist has renounced his noble title, his property and even his family in favor of poverty, vegetarianism and even celibacy.

After she’s born him thirteen children! When Sofya then discovers that Tolstoy’s trusted disciple, Chertkov ( Paul Giamatti )—whom she despises. » 24 November 2009 8:53 PM, PST | HollywoodChicago.com | See recent HollywoodChicago.com news » Chicago – Just in time for holiday shopping, HBO has released both seasons of the epic “Rome” in one gorgeously-packaged Blu-Ray set with all 22 episodes and bonus material including audio commentaries and behind-the-scenes featurettes. Whatever you may think of the show, “Rome” was one of the most beautifully designed programs of the decade and a perfect fit for 1080p. Blu-Ray Rating: 4.0/5.0 The winner of seven Emmy Awards takes place four hundred years after the founding of the Republic. Rome is brought vividly to life as an allegory for power struggles in any era. In the show, the days of shared power has come to an end and everyone is fighting for their part of the new structure - it’s the perfect backdrop for betrayal, excess, and corruption.

Blending historical figures like Julius Caesar , Marc Antony, and Cleopatra with their own narratives, “Rome” was a gorgeous blend of style and substance. » - adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman) Christopher Plummer in The Last Station Photo: Sony Pictures Classics The film that once was set to star Anthony Hopkins and Meryl Streep now stars Christopher Plummer and Helen Mirren and is supposedly a serious Oscar contender. That film is The Last Station and it's set to hit theaters in New York and L.A. on December 4. Michael Hoffman wrote and directed the film, an adaptation of Jay Parini 's novel of the same name, which is set in the last tumultuous years of Leo Tolstoy 's (Plummer) life, the historical biopic centers on the battle for his soul waged by his wife (Mirren) and his leading disciple, Vladimir Cherkov ( Paul Giamatti ). Torn between his professed codtrine of poverty and chastity and the reality of his enormous wealth, his thirteen children, and a life of hedonism, Tolstoy makes a dramatic flight from his home.

Too ill to continue beyond the tiny rail station at Astapovo, » - Brad Brevet 10 September 2009 7:28 AM, PDT | IFTN | See recent IFTN news » Shooting of new Irish film ' The Runway ' has got underway in Goleen and Schull, Co. Cork. The film is written and directed by Ian Power , produced by Macdara Kelleher and stars Mexican actor Demián Bichir (Che, Weeds ) alongside Irish actress Kerry Condon ( Angela's Ashes , Rome). The Runway ' is loosely inspired by the true events whereby a South American pilot crashed his airplane into a field near Mallow in Cork in 1983. Against all odds , the people of a depressed town called Dromoleen come together to build a runway, fix up a plane and get the pilot home. And in doing so caught, briefly, the imagination of a nation. » 27 August 2009 5:00 AM, PDT | The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News | See recent The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News news » Fidel Castro is heading to Ireland.

Demian Bichir , who most recently appeared as the Cuban leader in Steven Soderberg's "Che" biopics for IFC, is starring in the Irish indie feature " The Runway ." Commercials and short-film director Ian Power wrote the script and is directing the drama in County Cork. The film is based on the true story of a South American pilot who crashed near a town in Cork in 1983. The townspeople came together to build a runway to get the pilot home and briefly inspired the nation. Kerry Condon ("Rome") and Jaime Kierans co-star. Macdara Kelleher of Fastnet Films is producing with Brendan McDonald. Bernard Michaux will co-produce. The Irish Film Board and the Luxembourg Film Fund are co-financing the picture. Bichir, repped by UTA and manager Sekka Scher , is a regular on Showtime's " Weeds ." He has appeared in the features " Don't Tempt Me ," " In the Time of the Butterflies " and " Perdita Durango . » - By Jay A.

Fernandez The Last Station: Christopher Plummer, Patrick Kennedy, David Masterson, John Sessions, Paul Giamatti, Helen Mirren, James McAvoy, Tomas Spencer, Anne-Marie Duff, Kerry Condon, Michael Hoffman, Sebastian Edschmid: Amazon.co.uk: LOVEFiLM By Post LOVEFiLM by Post The Last Station 2010 Subtitles LOVEFiLM By Post Movies and TV seasons on DVD and Blu-ray to rent By Post. 4.0 out of 5 stars ( 56 ) IMDb 7/10 LOVEFiLM By Post Set in the last tumultuous years of famed Russian author Leo Tolstoy's life, centers on the battle for his soul waged by his wife Sofya Andreyevna and his leading disciple Vladimir Cherkov. Torn between his professed doctrine of poverty and chastity and the reality of his enormous wealth, his thirteen children and a life of hedonism, Tolstoy makes a dramatic flight from his home. Too ill to continue beyond the tiny rail station at Astapovo, he believes that he is dying alone, while over one hundred newspapermen camp outside awaiting hourly reports on his condition.

Starring: 1 hour 52 minutes Starring 1 hour 52 minutes Starring By Keris Nine TOP 500 REVIEWER on 23 Feb. 2010 Format: Blu-ray If you've read War and Peace and Anna Karenina or any other works by Tolstoy, the idea of a film about the great Russian author's fascinating latter years as he disavowed his earlier writings for deep religious principles and social reform is an intriguing prospect, but I'm sure there can't be too many others similarly thrilled by the notion. It is a strange subject to make a film around, there's no denying that, and indeed The Last Station - based around the struggle over the publishing rights of his entire works between Tolstoy's favourite disciple Chertkov (who wants them to be given freely to the people) and the Countess Sofya (who believes they belong to the family and herself who have supported the Count over the years) - isn't the most dramatically thrilling of situations.

To add variety to the constant back and forth battles, showdowns and shouting matches between Chertkov and the Countess over the terms of Tolstoy's will, there is a conventional romance thrown in between naï¿½ve new disciple Bulgakov and the rather more worldly Masha on Tolstoy's commune. Despite the fact that nearly all the situations take place around him between the other protagonists, Tolstoy however rightly retains the strongest position in the film, a fact that can be attributed almost entirely to a convincing performance by Christopher Plummer. While performances are equally as good elsewhere from Helen Mirren, James McAvoy, Paul Giamatti and John Sessions (particularly Mirren), it's hard not to see them as indeed "performances" by well-known and respected actors, whereas Plummer completely inhabits his role and convinces as Tolstoy, putting real character behind the man's revolutionary ascetic, pacifistic ideals. Read more › 62 people found this helpful. Was this review helpful to you? Yes No Sending feedback... Thank you for your feedback. Sorry, we failed to record your vote. Please try again By meg on 14 Mar.

2010 Format: DVD I suspect this *will* indeed end up being the best film of 2010 for me. I disagree slightly with the previous reviewer because I felt each one of the main actors completely 'inhabited' their roles. Because of that fact, the film had a depth of emotional reality ( a human 'core' if you will) that was incredibly moving. It is a film that made me laugh and cry in equal measure. I was engaged with it the entire time and the two hours (just under) passed in a blink. If I was to be REALLY pedantic, I would say the cinematography was not as great as it could/should have been. A cinematic film like this really deserves the best cinematography 'out there' and it fell slightly short of that. Also, on reflection, I would say there are a couple of awkward 'edits' and I suspect there is a lot on the cutting room floor. (PLEASE let them be on the DVD as extras!) Additionally, the film does not show all the events of the chronology of the period it purports to reflect - i.e. it does not show all of the events from the book by Jay Parini.

I would have preferred they *had done*, as a few of the events are quite telling and added to the flow of the storyline, notably: when Tolstoy leaves but comes back; when he attends court etc etc. Additionally, Valentin was not at the station with Tolstoy as shown in the film. However, in spite of these extremely pedantic niggles,it gets 5 stars from me because the overall effect was fabulous. The film really captures the 'energy' (or emotional and political resonance) of that period of time in Toltoys life - according to his writings, historical evidence and the diaries of his family/friends and employees. Brilliant. I will be buying this DVD as soon as it is released! (- this review is based on watching the film in a cinema) Comment 38 people found this helpful. Was this review helpful to you? Yes No Sending feedback... Thank you for your feedback. Sorry, we failed to record your vote. Please try again By Valerie J. on 19 Mar.

2014 Format: Blu-ray Verified Purchase It's Russia, 1910, and Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy (Christopher Plummer) is the most revered author of his day having written War and Peace, and Anna Karenina. He happily shuns material things and is contemplating leaving his works to the Russian people. His wife, Sofya (Helen Mirren), understandably doesn't see eye to eye with her husband's philanthropic views, worrying that her family will be left impoverished, and she voices her concerns quite openly. No matter what his wife's views are, Tolstoy has an active following in the Tolstoyans who live their lives according to what they believe to be Leo Tolstoy's principles. One leading Tolstoyan, Chertkov (Paul Giamatti), who edited Tolstoy's work, recruits a young man, Valentin Fyodorovich Bulgakov (James McAvoy), to be Tolstoy's personal secretary and requests that he make a note of everything the Countess says and does.

Chertkov aims to prevent Sofya influencing Tolstoy with regard to his last Will and Testament, and Bulgakov is unhappily trapped in a difficult situation of caring for both the Count and Countess. The Last Station (2009) is an engaging gem of a movie with a cast of actors who are just perfect in their roles. We can never know (unless we were a fly on the wall at the time) what was actually said between the various real life characters but the script of this movie is written in such a way that it's hard to doubt anything that was said or done. It's believable. Christopher Plummer is just marvellous as Tolstoy who, in his last year (in the movie) is pulled in two directions by Chertkov and Sofya. Plummer almost outshines Helen Mirren, which is no easy feat. She literally threw herself into the role of the desperate diva dreading the death of Tolstoy if he changed his Will. Read more › 2 Comments 5 people found this helpful. Was this review helpful to you? Yes No Sending feedback... Thank you for your feedback. Sorry, we failed to record your vote.

Please try again The Last Station - Wikipedia, Photos and Videos The Last Station NEXT GO TO RESULTS [51 .. 100] WIKIPEDIA ARTICLE $13,550,772 [2] The Last Station is a 2009 English-language German biographical drama film written and directed by Michael Hoffman , and based on Jay Parini 's 1990 biographical novel of the same name , which chronicled the final months of Leo Tolstoy 's life. [3] The film stars Christopher Plummer as Tolstoy and Helen Mirren as his wife Sofya Tolstaya . The film is about the battle between Sofya and his disciple Vladimir Chertkov for his legacy and the copyright of his works. [4] The film premiered at the 2009 Telluride Film Festival . Contents This article needs an improved plot summary . (October 2015) In 1910, the last year of Leo Tolstoy 's life, his disciples, led by Vladimir Chertkov , manoeuvre against his wife, Sofya, for control over Tolstoy's works after his death.

The main setting is the Tolstoy country estate of Yasnaya Polyana . Tolstoy and Sofya have had a long, passionate marriage, but his spiritual ideals and asceticism (he is opposed, for example, to private property) are at odds with her more aristocratic and conventionally religious views. Contention focuses on a new will that the " Tolstoians " are attempting to persuade him to sign. It would place all of his copyrights into the public domain , supposedly leaving his family without adequate support. The maneuvering is seen through the eyes of Tolstoy's new secretary, Valentin Bulgakov , who finds himself mediating between the two sides. He also has a love affair with one of the Tolstoians, Masha. Ultimately, Tolstoy signs the new will and travels to an undisclosed location where he can continue his work undisturbed. After his departure, Sofya unsuccessfully attempts suicide. During the journey, Tolstoy falls ill. The film ends with his death near the Astapovo train station where Sofya is allowed by their daughter to see him just moments before his death.

[3] The closing credits state that five years after his death the Russian senate reverted the copyrights of Tolstoy's work to Sofya. Production[ edit ] Filming took place in the German federal states of Saxony-Anhalt , Brandenburg ( Studio Babelsberg ) and Thuringia , the city of Leipzig in Saxony and at historical locations in Russia. [3] The location for Jasnaja Poljana, the residence of the Tolstoy family, was the Schloss Stülpe palace near Luckenwalde in Brandenburg. The station of the small German town of Pretzsch stood in for Astapovo , the "last station" of the title. Still a working rural station, the Pretzsch station was closed for two weeks for filming. [5] Release and reception[ edit ] Sony Pictures Classics acquired distribution rights and gave the film an awards-qualifying limited release [6] on 23 December 2009, with a wide release on 15 January 2010. It was released in Germany on 28 January 2010. The film has received generally positive reviews.

Review aggregate Rotten Tomatoes reports that 71% of critics have given the film a positive review based on 139 reviews, with an average score of 6.7/10. According to Rotten Tomatoes, "Michael Hoffman's script doesn't quite live up to its famous subject, but this Tolstoy biopic benefits from a spellbinding tour de force performance by Helen Mirren." [7] Critic Philip French praised McAvoy for bringing "the same amiable diffidence he brought to the role of Idi Amin's confidant in The Last King of Scotland". [4] Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times called Hoffman's direction "accomplished", and the film's centerpiece "the spectacular back and forth between Christopher Plummer and Helen Mirren....For those who enjoy actors who can play it up without ever overplaying their hands, "The Last Station" is the destination of choice." [8] On the negative side, one reviewer characterized the film as a "genteel domestic farce" and faulted the director for "pander[ing] to the worst impulses of the cast".

[9] Accolades[ edit ] Mirren won the Best Actress award at the 2009 Rome International Film Festival for her performance. [10] She was also nominated for Best Actress - Drama at the 67th Golden Globe Awards , as was Plummer for Best Supporting Actor in a Motion Picture. Both actors also received nominations for their performances from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and the Screen Actors Guild . Home media[ edit ] The film was released on DVD and Blu-ray on 22 June 2010. One reviewer criticized the lack of special features on the disc. [11] References[ edit ] ^ The Last Station: Christopher Plummer, Patrick Kennedy, David Masterson, John Sessions, Paul Giamatti, Helen Mirren, James McAvoy, Tomas Spencer, Anne-Marie Duff, Kerry Condon, Michael Hoffman, Sebastian Edschmid: Amazon.co.uk: LOVEFiLM By Post LOVEFiLM by Post The Last Station 2010 Subtitles LOVEFiLM By Post Movies and TV seasons on DVD and Blu-ray to rent By Post.

4.0 out of 5 stars ( 56 ) IMDb 7/10 LOVEFiLM By Post Set in the last tumultuous years of famed Russian author Leo Tolstoy's life, centers on the battle for his soul waged by his wife Sofya Andreyevna and his leading disciple Vladimir Cherkov. Torn between his professed doctrine of poverty and chastity and the reality of his enormous wealth, his thirteen children and a life of hedonism, Tolstoy makes a dramatic flight from his home. Too ill to continue beyond the tiny rail station at Astapovo, he believes that he is dying alone, while over one hundred newspapermen camp outside awaiting hourly reports on his condition. Starring: 1 hour 52 minutes Starring 1 hour 52 minutes Starring By Keris Nine TOP 500 REVIEWER on 23 Feb.

2010 Format: Blu-ray If you've read War and Peace and Anna Karenina or any other works by Tolstoy, the idea of a film about the great Russian author's fascinating latter years as he disavowed his earlier writings for deep religious principles and social reform is an intriguing prospect, but I'm sure there can't be too many others similarly thrilled by the notion. It is a strange subject to make a film around, there's no denying that, and indeed The Last Station - based around the struggle over the publishing rights of his entire works between Tolstoy's favourite disciple Chertkov (who wants them to be given freely to the people) and the Countess Sofya (who believes they belong to the family and herself who have supported the Count over the years) - isn't the most dramatically thrilling of situations. To add variety to the constant back and forth battles, showdowns and shouting matches between Chertkov and the Countess over the terms of Tolstoy's will, there is a conventional romance thrown in between naï¿½ve new disciple Bulgakov and the rather more worldly Masha on Tolstoy's commune.

Despite the fact that nearly all the situations take place around him between the other protagonists, Tolstoy however rightly retains the strongest position in the film, a fact that can be attributed almost entirely to a convincing performance by Christopher Plummer. While performances are equally as good elsewhere from Helen Mirren, James McAvoy, Paul Giamatti and John Sessions (particularly Mirren), it's hard not to see them as indeed "performances" by well-known and respected actors, whereas Plummer completely inhabits his role and convinces as Tolstoy, putting real character behind the man's revolutionary ascetic, pacifistic ideals. Read more › 62 people found this helpful. Was this review helpful to you? Yes No Sending feedback... Thank you for your feedback. Sorry, we failed to record your vote. Please try again By meg on 14 Mar. 2010 Format: DVD I suspect this *will* indeed end up being the best film of 2010 for me. I disagree slightly with the previous reviewer because I felt each one of the main actors completely 'inhabited' their roles.

Because of that fact, the film had a depth of emotional reality ( a human 'core' if you will) that was incredibly moving. It is a film that made me laugh and cry in equal measure. I was engaged with it the entire time and the two hours (just under) passed in a blink. If I was to be REALLY pedantic, I would say the cinematography was not as great as it could/should have been. A cinematic film like this really deserves the best cinematography 'out there' and it fell slightly short of that. Also, on reflection, I would say there are a couple of awkward 'edits' and I suspect there is a lot on the cutting room floor. (PLEASE let them be on the DVD as extras!) Additionally, the film does not show all the events of the chronology of the period it purports to reflect - i.e. it does not show all of the events from the book by Jay Parini. I would have preferred they *had done*, as a few of the events are quite telling and added to the flow of the storyline, notably: when Tolstoy leaves but comes back; when he attends court etc etc.

Additionally, Valentin was not at the station with Tolstoy as shown in the film. However, in spite of these extremely pedantic niggles,it gets 5 stars from me because the overall effect was fabulous. The film really captures the 'energy' (or emotional and political resonance) of that period of time in Toltoys life - according to his writings, historical evidence and the diaries of his family/friends and employees. Brilliant. I will be buying this DVD as soon as it is released! (- this review is based on watching the film in a cinema) Comment 38 people found this helpful. Was this review helpful to you? Yes No Sending feedback... Thank you for your feedback. Sorry, we failed to record your vote. Please try again By Valerie J. on 19 Mar. 2014 Format: Blu-ray Verified Purchase It's Russia, 1910, and Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy (Christopher Plummer) is the most revered author of his day having written War and Peace, and Anna Karenina. He happily shuns material things and is contemplating leaving his works to the Russian people.

His wife, Sofya (Helen Mirren), understandably doesn't see eye to eye with her husband's philanthropic views, worrying that her family will be left impoverished, and she voices her concerns quite openly. No matter what his wife's views are, Tolstoy has an active following in the Tolstoyans who live their lives according to what they believe to be Leo Tolstoy's principles. One leading Tolstoyan, Chertkov (Paul Giamatti), who edited Tolstoy's work, recruits a young man, Valentin Fyodorovich Bulgakov (James McAvoy), to be Tolstoy's personal secretary and requests that he make a note of everything the Countess says and does. Chertkov aims to prevent Sofya influencing Tolstoy with regard to his last Will and Testament, and Bulgakov is unhappily trapped in a difficult situation of caring for both the Count and Countess. The Last Station (2009) is an engaging gem of a movie with a cast of actors who are just perfect in their roles.

We can never know (unless we were a fly on the wall at the time) what was actually said between the various real life characters but the script of this movie is written in such a way that it's hard to doubt anything that was said or done. It's believable. Christopher Plummer is just marvellous as Tolstoy who, in his last year (in the movie) is pulled in two directions by Chertkov and Sofya. Plummer almost outshines Helen Mirren, which is no easy feat. She literally threw herself into the role of the desperate diva dreading the death of Tolstoy if he changed his Will. Read more › 2 Comments 5 people found this helpful. Was this review helpful to you? Yes No Sending feedback... Thank you for your feedback. Sorry, we failed to record your vote.

Please try again Amazon.com: Customer Reviews: The Last Station The Last Station 4.2 out of 5 stars 112 Price:$6.28+ Free shipping with Amazon Prime Your rating( Clear )Rate this item 2 people found this helpful 5.0 out of 5 starsHelen Mirren is brilliant as Tolstoy's tempestuous ByJ.T.'s Reviewson October 19, 2015 The Last Station examines the last year of Leo Tolstoy's life. Portrayed convincingly by Christopher Plummer, the film reflects the shift in cultural currents and hints at the profound political upheaval Russia will endure not many years later. Helen Mirren is brilliant as Tolstoy's tempestuous, but devoted, wife Sofya, and Paul Giamatti is perfect as the zealous and calculating "true believer" who is more than capable of ruthlessness to preserve a social experiment and create a myth, even if that means denying his dying hero what he wants most, his beloved Sofya. James McAvoy captures the innocence of idealistic and inexperienced youth as Tolstoy's latest secretary.

He enters the lives of Leo and Sofya as a young man devoted to theory and principles and leaves as a wiser young man who appreciates the things Tolstoy valued, such as the simple joy of being alive and, above all, love. This is a film that admirers of "War and Peace" and "Anna Karenina" will likely appreciate. I know I did. The Last Station - Alchetron, The Free Social Encyclopedia I am a simple man trying to live a simple life !!!!!! The Last Station Initial DVD release June 22, 2010 Duration Release date 23 December 2009 (2009-12-23) Based on The Last Station by Jay Parini Writer Michael Hoffman (screenplay), Jay Parini (based on the novel by) Cast James McAvoy (Valentin Bulgakov), Christopher Plummer (Leo Tolstoy), Helen Mirren (Sofya Tolstoya), Paul Giamatti (Vladimir Chertkov), Anne-Marie Duff (Sasha Tolstoy), Kerry Condon (Masha) Similar movies Anna Karenina (2012) Tagline Intoxicating. Infuriating. Impossible.

Love. James mcavoy the last station trailer english Sponsored Links In 1910, famed novelist Leo Tolstoy (Christopher Plummer) and his wife Sofya (Helen Mirren) vehemently disagree over the rights to Tolstoys literary legacy. Sofya believes her husband should bequeath them to her upon his death, while Tolstoys chief disciple, Chertkov (Paul Giamatti), has nearly convinced the writer to sign the rights over to the Russian people. To this end, Chertkov inserts a spy into Tolstoys household, who promptly falls for one of the novelists daughters. The Last Station is a 2009 English-language German biographical drama film written and directed by Michael Hoffman, and based on Jay Parinis 1990 biographical novel of the same name, which chronicled the final months of Leo Tolstoys life. The film stars Christopher Plummer as Tolstoy and Helen Mirren as his wife Sofya Tolstaya. The film is about the battle between Sofya and his disciple Vladimir Chertkov for his legacy and the copyright of his works. The film premiered at the 2009 Telluride Film Festival.

A historical drama that illustrates Russian author Leo Tolstoy's struggle to balance fame and wealth with his commitment to a life devoid of material things. The Countess Sofya, wife and muse to Leo Tolstoy, uses every trick of seduction on her husband's loyal disciple, whom she believes was the person responsible for Tolstoy signing a new will that leaves his work and property to the Russian people. The last station movie trailer Plot In 1910, the last year of Leo Tolstoys life, his disciples, led by Vladimir Chertkov, manoeuvre against his wife, Sofya, for control over Tolstoys works after his death. The main setting is the Tolstoy country estate of Yasnaya Polyana. Tolstoy and Sofya have had a long, passionate marriage, but his spiritual ideals and asceticism (he is opposed, for example, to private property) are at odds with her more aristocratic and conventionally religious views. Contention focuses on a new will that the "Tolstoians" are attempting to persuade him to sign. It would place all of his copyrights into the public domain, supposedly leaving his family without adequate support.

The maneuvering is seen through the eyes of Tolstoys new secretary, Valentin Bulgakov, who finds himself mediating between the two sides. He also has a love affair with one of the Tolstoians, Masha. Ultimately, Tolstoy signs the new will and travels to an undisclosed location where he can continue his work undisturbed. After his departure, Sofya unsuccessfully attempts suicide. During the journey, Tolstoy falls ill. The film ends with his death near the Astapovo train station where Sofya is allowed by their daughter to see him just moments before his death. The closing credits state that five years after his death the Russian senate reverted the copyrights of Tolstoys work to Sofya. Cast Christopher Plummer as Leo Tolstoy Helen Mirren as Sofya, Leos wife. Paul Giamatti as Vladimir Chertkov, the leader of Tolstoys devoted disciples. James McAvoy as Valentin Fedorovich Bulgakov, a private secretary. Kerry Condon as Masha, a fictional member of the Tolstoyans. Anne-Marie Duff as Sasha, Leo and Sofias daughter. Patrick Kennedy as Sergeyenko John Sessions as Dr.

Dusan Makovicky, a Slovak, Leos personal doctor. Production Filming took place in the German federal states of Saxony-Anhalt, Brandenburg (Studio Babelsberg) and Thuringia, the city of Leipzig in Saxony and at historical locations in Russia. The location for Jasnaja Poljana, the residence of the Tolstoy family, was the Schloss Stulpe palace near Luckenwalde in Brandenburg. The station of the small German town of Pretzsch stood in for Astapovo, the "last station" of the title. Still a working rural station, the Pretzsch station was closed for two weeks for filming. Release and reception Sony Pictures Classics acquired distribution rights and gave the film an awards-qualifying limited release on 23 December 2009, with a wide release on 15 January 2010. It was released in Germany on 28 January 2010. Sponsored Links The film has received generally positive reviews. Review aggregate Rotten Tomatoes reports that 71% of critics have given the film a positive review based on 139 reviews, with an average score of 6.7/10.

According to Rotten Tomatoes, "Michael Hoffmans script doesnt quite live up to its famous subject, but this Tolstoy biopic benefits from a spellbinding tour de force performance by Helen Mirren." Critic Philip French praised McAvoy for bringing "the same amiable diffidence he brought to the role of Idi Amins confidant in The Last King of Scotland". Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times called Hoffmans direction "accomplished", and the films centerpiece "the spectacular back and forth between Christopher Plummer and Helen Mirren....For those who enjoy actors who can play it up without ever overplaying their hands, "The Last Station" is the destination of choice." On the negative side, one reviewer characterized the film as a "genteel domestic farce" and faulted the director for "pander[ing] to the worst impulses of the cast". Accolades Mirren won the Best Actress award at the 2009 Rome International Film Festival for her performance. She was also nominated for Best Actress - Drama at the 67th Golden Globe Awards, as was Plummer for Best Supporting Actor in a Motion Picture.

Both actors also received nominations for their performances from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and the Screen Actors Guild. Similar Movies Anna Karenina (2012). James McAvoy appears in The Last Station and Becoming Jane. War and Peace (1956). Helen Mirren appears in The Last Station and The Queen. Helen Mirren appears in The Last Station and Hitchcock. Home media The film was released on DVD and Blu-ray on 22 June 2010. One reviewer criticized the lack of special features on the disc.

Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy (1828 - 1910) - Genealogy Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy Yasnaya Polyana, Tula, gorod Tula, Tulskaya oblast', Russia Death: in Lev Tolstoy, Lev-Tolstovsky District, Lipetskaya oblast, Russia Immediate Family: Nicholas Ilich Tolstoy, Maria Nikolaevna Tolstoy (born Volkonskaya) Wife: Sophia "Sonya" Andreyevna Tolstoy (born Behrs) Children: ...olstoy, Varvara Lvovna Tolstaya, Andrei Levovich " Andryusha" Tolstoy, Mikhail Lvovich Count Tolstoy, Alexei Lvovich Tolstoy, Alexandra L... Siblings: Aug 28 1828 - им. Ясная Поляна, Крапивенский уезд, Тульская губ., Россия Death: Nov 7 1910 - ст. Астапово, Рязанская губ.

(ныне Лев Толстой, Липецкая обл.), Россия Wife: Софья Андреевна Толстая (née Берс) Son: Aug 28 1828 - им. Ясная Поляна, Крапивенский уезд, Тульская губ., Россия Death: Nov 7 1910 - ст. Астапово, Рязанская губ.

(ныне Лев Толстой, Липецкая обл.), Россия Parents: Николай Ильич Толстой, Мария Николаевна Толстая (Волконская) Wife: Aug 28 1828 - Iasnaia Poliana, Gouvernement de Toula, Russie Death: Nov 7 1910 - Astapovo, Gouvernement de Toula, Russie Parents: Nicolas Ilyitch Tolstoi, Maria Nicolaevna Tolstoi (born Wolkonsky) Siblings: Nicolas Nicolaevitch Tolstoi, Serge Nicolaevitch Tolstoi, Dimitrii Nicolaevitch Tolstoi, Maria Nicolaevna Tolstoi Wife: Sophia Andreievna Tolstoi (born Behrs) Children: ...Soukhotine (born Tolstoi), Ilya Lvovitch Tolstoi, Lev Lvovitch Tolstoi, Maria Lvovna Obolensky (born Tolstoi), Pierre Lvovitch Tolstoi, N...

Николай Ильич Толстой, Мария Николаевна Толстая, графиня (Волконская) Siblings: Николай Николаевич Толстой, Сергей Николаевич Толстой, Дмитрий Николаевич Толстой, Мария Николаевна Толстая (графиня Толстая) Wife: Софья Андреевна Толстая (Берс) Children: ...Сухотина-Толстая (графиня Толстая), Илья Львович Толстой, Лев Львович Толстой, Мария Львовна Оболенская (графиня Толстая), Пётр Львович Т...

Sep 9 1828 - landgoed Jasnaja Poljana Death: Nov 20 1910 - Astapovo, Gouvernement de Toula, Russie Parents: Николай Ильич Толстой, Мария Николаевна Толстая (nata Волконская) Siblings: Mishenka Tolstoj, Николай Николаевич Толстой, Сергей Николаевич Толстой, Дмитрий Николаевич Толстой, Мария Николаевна Толстая Wife: Sofia Andrejevna Tolstoj (nata Behrs) Partner: <Private> Tolstoj Children: ..., Tatiana Lvovna Soukhotine (nata Tolstoi), Ilya Lvovitch Tolstoj, Leon Lvovitch Tolstoj, Maria Lvovna Obolensky (nata Tolstoj), Pierre L...

Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers, 1836-1922 Text: "...1 O ( o TOLSTOY PASSES INTO DEATH SLEEP End ot the Career of the Famous nusslsn Author. COUNT LEO TOLSTOY'S CAR ICR IN BRIEF. Horn Vu... Publication: Crystal Falls, Iron, Michigan, USA Date: Sep 9 1828 - Jasnaja Poljana, Tulskaja oblast, Ryssland Death: Nov 20 1910 - Astapovo i Rjazanskaja oblast, Ryssland Parents: Nikolay Ilyich Tolstoy, Maria Tolstoy (född Volkonskaya) Siblings: Mishenka Tolstoj, Nikolay Tolstoy, Sergey Tolstoy, Dmitriy Tolstoy, Mariya Tolstaya Wife: Sofia Andrejevna (Sonya) Tolstoy (född Behrs) Wife: Axinya Tolstoy (född Bazykin) Children: ...

Tatyana Lvovna (Tanya) Sukhotin (född Tolstoya), Ilya Tolstoy, Leo (Ii) Tolstoy, Marya (Masha) Obolenski (född Tolstoy), Pyotr (Petya) T... Sep 9 1828 - Jasnaja Poljana, Tulskaja oblast, Ryssland Death: Nov 20 1910 - Astapovo i Rjazanskaja oblast, Ryssland Parents: Nikolay Ilyich Tolstoy, Maria Tolstoy (född Volkonskaya) Siblings: Mishenka Tolstoj, Nikolay Tolstoy, Sergey Tolstoy, Dmitriy Tolstoy, Mariya Tolstaya Wife: Sofia Andrejevna (Sonya) Tolstoy (född Behrs) Wife: Axinya Tolstoy (född Bazykin) Children: ...

Tatyana Lvovna (Tanya) Sukhotin (född Tolstoya), Ilya Tolstoy, Leo (Ii) Tolstoy, Marya (Masha) Obolenski (född Tolstoy), Pyotr (Petya) T... Sep 9 1828 - Jasnaja Poljana, Tulskaja oblast, Ryssland Death: Nov 20 1910 - Astapovo i Rjazanskaja oblast, Ryssland Parents: Nikolay Ilyich Tolstoy, Maria Tolstoy (född Volkonskaya) Siblings: Mishenka Tolstoj, Nikolay Tolstoy, Sergey Tolstoy, Dmitriy Tolstoy, Mariya Tolstaya Wife: Sofia Andrejevna (Sonya) Tolstoy (född Behrs) Wife: Axinya Tolstoy (född Bazykin) Children: ...

Tatyana Lvovna (Tanya) Sukhotin (född Tolstoya), Ilya Tolstoy, Leo (Ii) Tolstoy, Marya (Masha) Obolenski (född Tolstoy), Pyotr (Petya) T... Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers, 1836-1922 Text: "...in Colorado at the recent election In the death of Count Leo Tolstoy scholar phylosophsr and scientist of Russia the world looses gre... Publication: Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers, 1836-1922 Text: "...street. Brooklyn. TOLSTOY LAID TO REST Buried with Simplest Ceremony at Spot Chosen by Author. GREAT THRONG AT GRAVE Demonstrations i...

Publication: New York, New York, New York, USA Date: About Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy Leo Tolstoy (From Wikipedia) Leo Tolstoy, or Count Lyev Nikolayevich Tolstoy (Russian: About this sound Лeв Никола́евич Толсто́й​ (help·info), Russian pronunciation: [lʲev nʲɪkɐˈlaɪvʲɪtɕ tɐlˈstoj]; September 9 [O.S. August 28] 1828 – November 20 [O.S. November 7] 1910), was a Russian writer whom many consider to be the world's greatest novelist. His masterpieces War and Peace and Anna Karenina represent, in their scope, breadth and vivid depiction of 19th-century Russian life and attitudes, the peak of realist fiction. Tolstoy's further talents as essayist, dramatist, and educational reformer made him the most influential member of the aristocratic Tolstoy family.

His literal interpretation of the ethical teachings of Jesus, centering on the Sermon on the Mount, caused him in later life to become a fervent Christian anarchist and pacifist. His ideas on nonviolent resistance, expressed in such works as The Kingdom of God Is Within You, were to have a profound impact on such pivotal twentieth-century figures as Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. Novelist best known for War and Peace and Anna Karenina Early life Tolstoy was born in Yasnaya Polyana, the family estate in the Tula region of Russia. The Tolstoys were a well-known family of old Russian nobility. He was the fourth of five children of Count Nikolai Ilyich Tolstoy, a veteran of the crusade of 1812, and Countess Mariya Tolstaya (Volkonskaya). Tolstoy's parents died when he was young, so he and his siblings were brought up by relatives. In 1844, he began studying law and oriental languages at Kazan University.

His teachers described him as "both unable and unwilling to learn." Tolstoy left university in the middle of his studies, returned to Yasnaya Polyana and then spent much of his time in Moscow and Saint Petersburg. In 1851, after running up heavy gambling debts, he went with his elder brother to the Caucasus and joined the army. Around this time, he started writing. His conversion from a dissolute and privileged society author to the non-violent and spiritual anarchist of his latter days was brought about by two trips around Europe in 1857 and 1860–61, a period when many liberal-leaning Russian aristocrats escaped the stifling political repression in Russia; others who followed the same path were Alexander Herzen, Mikhail Bakunin, and Peter Kropotkin. During his 1857 visit, Tolstoy witnessed a public execution in Paris, a traumatic experience that would mark the rest of his life. Writing in a letter to his friend V. P. Botkin: "The truth is that the State is a conspiracy designed not only to exploit, but above all to corrupt its citizens ...

Henceforth, I shall never serve any government anywhere." His European trip in 1860–61 shaped both his political and literary transformation when he met Victor Hugo, whose literary talents Tolstoy praised after reading Hugo's newly finished Les Miserables. A comparison of Hugo's novel and Tolstoy's War and Peace shows the influence of the evocation of its battle scenes. Tolstoy's political philosophy was also influenced by a March 1861 visit to French anarchist Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, then living in exile under an assumed name in Brussels.

Apart from reviewing Proudhon's forthcoming publication, La Guerre et la Paix, whose title Tolstoy would borrow for his masterpiece, the two men discussed education, as Tolstoy wrote in his educational notebooks: 'If I recount this conversation with Proudhon, it is to show that, in my personal experience, he was the only man who understood the significance of education and of the printing press in our time." Fired by enthusiasm, Tolstoy returned to Yasnaya Polyana and founded thirteen schools for his serfs' children, based on the principles Tolstoy described in his 1862 essay "The School at Yasnaya Polyana". Tolstoy's educational experiments were short-lived due to harassment by the Tsarist secret police, but as a direct forerunner to A. S. Neill's Summerhill School, the school at Yasnaya Polyana can justifiably be claimed to be the first example of a coherent theory of democratic education. Personal life On 23 September 1862, Tolstoy married Sophia Andreevna Bers, the daughter of a court physician, who was 16 years his junior.

(Sonya, the Russian diminutive of Sofya, is the name that was used by her family and friends) They had thirteen children, five of whom died during childhood. The marriage was marked from the outset by sexual passion and emotional insensitivity when Tolstoy, on the eve of their marriage, gave her his diaries detailing his extensive sexual past and the fact that one of the serfs on his estate had borne him a son. Even so, their early married life was ostensibly happy and allowed Tolstoy much freedom to compose the literary masterpieces War and Peace and Anna Karenina with Sonya acting as his secretary, proof-reader and financial manager. However, their later life together has been described by A. N. Wilson as one of the unhappiest in literary history. His relationship with his wife deteriorated as his beliefs became increasingly radical and he sought to reject his inherited and earned wealth, including the renunciation of the copyrights on his earlier works. Novels and fictional works Tolstoy is one of the giants of Russian literature. His most famous works include the novels War and Peace and Anna Karenina and novellas such as Hadji Murad and The Death of Ivan Ilyich. His contemporaries paid him lofty tributes.

Dostoevsky thought him the greatest of all living novelists, while Flaubert exclaimed, "What an artist and what a psychologist!" on reading a translation of War and Peace. Chekhov, who often visited Tolstoy at his country estate, wrote, "When literature possesses a Tolstoy, it is easy and pleasant to be a writer; even when you know you have achieved nothing yourself and are still achieving nothing, this is not as terrible as it might otherwise be, because Tolstoy achieves for everyone. What he does serves to justify all the hopes and aspirations invested in literature." Tolstoy in military uniform, by Sergei Lvovich Levitsky, 1856 Later critics and novelists continue to bear testament to Tolstoy's art. Virginia Woolf declared him the greatest of all novelists. James Joyce noted that, "He is never dull, never stupid, never tired, never pedantic, never theatrical!". Thomas Mann wrote of Tolstoy's seemingly guileless artistry: "Seldom did art work so much like nature". Such sentiments were shared by the likes of Proust, Faulkner and Nabokov.

The latter heaped superlatives upon The Death of Ivan Ilyich and Anna Karenina; he questioned, however, the reputation of War and Peace, and sharply criticized Resurrection and The Kreutzer Sonata. Tolstoy's earliest works, the autobiographical novels Childhood, Boyhood, and Youth (1852–1856), tell of a rich landowner's son and his slow realization of the chasm between himself and his peasants. Though he later rejected them as sentimental, a great deal of Tolstoy's own life is revealed. They retain their relevance as accounts of the universal story of growing up. Tolstoy served as a second lieutenant in an artillery regiment during the Crimean War, recounted in his Sevastapol Sketches. His experiences in battle helped stir his subsequent pacifism and gave him material for realistic depiction of war's horrors in his later work. His fiction consistently attempts to convey realistically the Russian society in which he lived.[12]The Cossacks (1863) describes the Cossack life and people through a story of a Russian aristocrat in love with a Cossack girl.

Anna Karenina (1877) tells parallel stories of an adulterous woman trapped by the conventions and falsities of society and of a philosophical landowner (much like Tolstoy), who works alongside the peasants in the fields and seeks to reform their lives. Tolstoy not only drew from his experience of life but created characters in his own image, such as Pierre Bezukhov and Prince Andrei in War and Peace, Levin in Anna Karenina and to some extent, Prince Nekhlyudov in Resurrection. War and Peace is generally thought to be one of the greatest novels ever written, remarkable for its breadth and unity. Its vast canvas includes 580 characters, many historical, others fictional. The story moves from family life to the headquarters of Napoleon, from the court of Alexander I of Russia to the battlefields of Austerlitz and Borodino. Tolstoy's original idea for the novel was to investigate the causes of the Decembrist revolt, to which it refers only in the last chapters, from which can be deduced that Andrei Bolkonski's son will become one of the Decembrists.

The novel explores Tolstoy's theory of history, and in particular the insignificance of individuals such as Napoleon and Alexander. Somewhat surprisingly, Tolstoy did not consider War and Peace to be a novel (nor did he consider many of the great Russian fictions written at that time to be novels). This view becomes less surprising if one considers that Tolstoy was a novelist of the realist school who considered the novel to be a framework for the examination of social and political issues in nineteenth-century life. War and Peace (which is to Tolstoy really an epic in prose) therefore did not qualify. Tolstoy thought that Anna Karenina was his first true novel. After Anna Karenina, Tolstoy concentrated on Christian themes, and his later novels such as The Death of Ivan Ilyich (1886) and What Is to Be Done? develop a radical anarcho-pacifist Christian philosophy which led to his excommunication from the Russian Orthodox Church in 1901. For all the praise showered on Anna Karenina and War and Peace, Tolstoy rejected the two works later in his life as something not as true of reality.

Such an argument is supported in The Death of Ivan Ilyich, whose main character continually battles with his family and servants, demanding honesty above the water and food needed to sustain him. [edit] Tolstoy on Shakespeare Main article: Tolstoy on Shakespeare During his life, Tolstoy came to the conclusion that William Shakespeare was a bad dramatist and not a true artist at all. Tolstoy explained his views in a critical essay on Shakespeare written in 1903. I remember the astonishment I felt when I first read Shakespeare. I expected to receive a powerful aesthetic pleasure, but having read, one after the other, works regarded as his best: "King Lear", "Romeo and Juliet", "Hamlet" and "Macbeth," not only did I feel no delight, but I felt an irresistible repulsion and tedium... Several times I read the dramas and the comedies and historical plays, and I invariably underwent the same feelings: repulsion, weariness, and bewilderment.

At the present time, before writing this preface, being desirous once more to test myself, I have, as an old man of seventy-five, again read the whole of Shakespeare, including the historical plays, the "Henrys," "Troilus and Cressida," the "Tempest," "Cymbeline," and I have felt, with even greater force, the same feelings,—this time, however, not of bewilderment, but of firm, indubitable conviction that the unquestionable glory of a great genius which Shakespeare enjoys, and which compels writers of our time to imitate him and readers and spectators to discover in him non-existent merits,—thereby distorting their aesthetic and ethical understanding,—is a great evil, as is every untruth. Tolstoy on Shakespeare. 1906. Understanding that his conclusions contradict popular opinion, Tolstoy supported his opinion by detailed analysis of King Lear. George Orwell wrote a well-known response to this: Lear, Tolstoy and the Fool.

Religious and political beliefs After reading Schopenhauer's The World as Will and Representation, Tolstoy gradually became converted to the ascetic morality upheld in that work as the proper spiritual path for the upper classes: Do you know what this summer has meant for me? Constant raptures over Schopenhauer and a whole series of spiritual delights which I've never experienced before. ... no student has ever studied so much on his course, and learned so much, as I have this summer. In Chapter VI of A Confession, Tolstoy quoted the final paragraph of Schopenhauer's work. It explained how the nothingness that results from complete denial of self is only a relative nothingness, and is not to be feared. The novelist was struck by the description of Christian, Buddhist, and Hindu ascetic renunciation as being the path to holiness.

After reading passages such as the following, which abound in Schopenhauer's ethical chapters, the Russian nobleman chose poverty and formal denial of the will: But this very necessity of involuntary suffering (by poor people) for eternal salvation is also expressed by that utterance of the Savior (Matthew 19:24): "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God." Therefore those who were greatly in earnest about their eternal salvation, chose voluntary poverty when fate had denied this to them and they had been born in wealth. Thus Buddha Sakyamuni was born a prince, but voluntarily took to the mendicant's staff; and Francis of Assisi, the founder of the mendicant orders who, as a youngster at a ball, where the daughters of all the notabilities were sitting together, was asked: "Now Francis, will you not soon make your choice from these beauties?" and who replied: "I have made a far more beautiful choice!" "Whom?" "La poverta (poverty)": whereupon he abandoned every thing shortly afterwards and wandered through the land as a mendicant.

Tolstoy's Christian beliefs centered on the Sermon on the Mount, particularly the injunction to turn the other cheek, which he saw as a justification for pacifism, nonviolence and nonresistance. Various versions of "Tolstoy's Bible" have been published, indicating the passages Tolstoy most relied on, specifically, the reported words of Jesus himself.[17] Tolstoy believed being a Christian required him to be a pacifist; the consequences of being a pacifist, and the apparently inevitable waging of war by government, made him a philosophical anarchist. Tolstoy believed that a true Christian could find lasting happiness by striving for inner self-perfection through following the Great Commandment of loving one's neighbor and God rather than looking outward to the Church or state for guidance.[citation needed] His belief in nonresistance (nonviolence) when faced by conflict is another distinct attribute of his philosophy based on Christ's teachings.[citation needed] By directly influencing Mahatma Gandhi with this idea through his work The Kingdom of God is Within You (full text of English translation available on Wikisource), Tolstoy has had a huge influence on the nonviolent resistance movement to this day.

He believed that the aristocracy were a burden on the poor, and that the only solution to how we live together is through anarchism.[citation needed] He also opposed private property and the institution of marriage and valued the ideals of chastity and sexual abstinence (discussed in Father Sergius and his preface to The Kreutzer Sonata), ideals also held by the young Gandhi. Tolstoy's later work derives a passion and verve from the depth of his austere moral views. The sequence of the temptation of Sergius in Father Sergius, for example, is among his later triumphs. Gorky relates how Tolstoy once read this passage before himself and Chekhov and that Tolstoy was moved to tears by the end of the reading. Other later passages of rare power include the crises of self faced by the protagonists of The Death of Ivan Ilyich and Master and Man, where the main character in the former or the reader in the latter is made aware of the foolishness of the protagonists' lives. Tolstoy commemorated on a Soviet stamp issued in 1978 Tolstoy had a profound influence on the development of Christian anarchist thought.

The Tolstoyans were a small Christian anarchist group formed by Tolstoy's companion, Vladimir Chertkov (1854–1936), in order to spread Tolstoy's religious teachings. Prince Peter Kropotkin wrote of Tolstoy in the article on anarchism in the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica: Without naming himself an anarchist, Leo Tolstoy, like his predecessors in the popular religious movements of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, Chojecki, Denk and many others, took the anarchist position as regards the state and property rights, deducing his conclusions from the general spirit of the teachings of Jesus and from the necessary dictates of reason. With all the might of his talent he made (especially in The Kingdom of God is Within You) a powerful criticism of the church, the state and law altogether, and especially of the present property laws. He describes the state as the domination of the wicked ones, supported by brutal force. Robbers, he says, are far less dangerous than a well-organized government.

He makes a searching criticism of the prejudices which are current now concerning the benefits conferred upon men by the church, the state and the existing distribution of property, and from the teachings of Jesus he deduces the rule of non-resistance and the absolute condemnation of all wars. His religious arguments are, however, so well combined with arguments borrowed from a dispassionate observation of the present evils, that the anarchist portions of his works appeal to the religious and the non-religious reader alike. During the Boxer Rebellion in China, Tolstoy praised the Boxers, and harshly criticized the atrocities done by the Russians and other western troops, and accused them of engaging in slaughter when he heard about the lootings, rapes, and murders, and raged against Christian brutality. He also named the two monarchs most responsible for the atrocities, Nicholas II of Russia and Wilhelm II of Germany. Tolystoy also read Confucian works.

In hundreds of essays over the last twenty years of his life, Tolstoy reiterated the anarchist critique of the state and recommended books by Kropotkin and Proudhon to his readers, whilst rejecting anarchism's espousal of violent revolutionary means, writing in the 1900 essay, "On Anarchy": "The Anarchists are right in everything; in the negation of the existing order, and in the assertion that, without Authority, there could not be worse violence than that of Authority under existing conditions. They are mistaken only in thinking that Anarchy can be instituted by a revolution. But it will be instituted only by there being more and more people who do not require the protection of governmental power ... There can be only one permanent revolution—a moral one: the regeneration of the inner man." Despite his misgivings about anarchist violence, Tolstoy took risks to circulate the prohibited publications of anarchist thinkers in Russia, and corrected the proofs of Kropotkin's "Words of a Rebel", illegally published in St Petersburg in 1906. Tolstoy's house at Yasnaya Polyana, today a museum.

A letter Tolstoy wrote in 1908 to an Indian newspaper entitled A Letter to a Hindu resulted in intense correspondence with Mohandas Gandhi, who was in South Africa at the time and was beginning to become an activist. Reading The Kingdom of God is Within You had convinced Gandhi to abandon violence and espouse nonviolent resistance, a debt Gandhi acknowledged in his autobiography, calling Tolstoy "the greatest apostle of non-violence that the present age has produced". The correspondence between Tolstoy and Gandhi would only last a year, from October 1909 until Tolstoy's death in November 1910, but led Gandhi to give the name the Tolstoy Colony to his second ashram in South Africa. Besides non-violent resistance, the two men shared a common belief in the merits of vegetarianism, the subject of several of Tolstoy's essays. Along with his growing idealism, Tolstoy also became a major supporter of the Esperanto movement. Tolstoy was impressed by the pacifist beliefs of the Doukhobors and brought their persecution to the attention of the international community, after they burned their weapons in peaceful protest in 1895.

He aided the Doukhobors in migrating to Canada. In 1904, during the Russo-Japanese War, Tolstoy condemned the war and wrote to the Japanese Buddhist priest Soyen Shaku in a failed attempt to make a joint pacifist statement. Tolstoy was a wealthy member of the Russian nobility. He came to believe that he was undeserving of his inherited wealth, and was renowned among the peasantry for his generosity. He would frequently return to his country estate with vagrants whom he felt needed a helping hand, and would often dispense large sums of money to street beggars while on trips to the city, much to his wife's chagrin. Death Tolstoy died of pneumonia at Astapovo station in 1910 after leaving home in the middle of winter at the age of 82. His death came only days after gathering the nerve to abandon his family and wealth and take up the path of a wandering ascetic, a path that he had agonized over pursuing for decades. He had not been at the peak of health before leaving home; his wife and daughters were all actively engaged in caring for him daily.

He had been speaking and writing of his own death in the days preceding his departure from home, but fell ill at the train station not far from home. The station master took Tolstoy to his apartment, where his personal doctors were called to the scene. He was given injections of morphine and camphor. The police tried to limit access to his funeral procession, but thousands of peasants lined the streets at his funeral. Still, some peasants were heard to say that, other than knowing that "some nobleman had died," they knew little else about Tolstoy. In film A 2009 movie based on Tolstoy's final year, The Last Station, was made by director Michael Hoffman with Christopher Plummer as Tolstoy and Helen Mirren as Sofya Tolstoya. Both performers were nominated for Oscars for their roles. There have been other films about the writer, including Departure of a Grand Old Man, made in 1912 just two years after his death, How Fine, How Fresh the Roses Were (1913), and Leo Tolstoy, directed by and starring Sergei Gerasimov in 1984.

There is also a famous lost film of Tolstoy made a decade before he died. In 1901, the American travel lecturer Burton Holmes visited Yasnaya Polyana with Albert J. Beveridge, the U.S. senator and historian. As the three men conversed, Holmes filmed Tolstoy with his 60-mm movie camera. Afterwards, Beveridge's advisers succeeded in having the film destroyed, fearing that documentary evidence of a meeting with the Russian author might hurt Beveridge's chances of running for the U.S. presidency.

Works Main article: Bibliography of Leo Tolstoy Novels and novellas * Family Happiness (Семейное счастье [Semeynoe schast`e]; novella, 1859) * The Cossacks (Казаки [Kazaki]; 1863) * War and Peace (Война и мир [Voyna i mir]; 1865–1869) * Anna Karenina (Анна Каренина [Anna Karenina]; 1875–77) * The Death of Ivan Ilyich (Смерть Ивана Ильича [Smert' Ivana Il'icha]; novella, 1887) * The Kreutzer Sonata (Крейцерова соната [Kreitserova Sonata]; 1889) * Resurrection (Воскресение [Voskresenie]; 1899) * Hadji Murat (Хаджи-Мурат [Khadzhi-Murat]; written in 1896–1904, published 1912) Short stories * Sevastopol

 Stories (Севастопольские рассказы [Sevastopolskie Rasskazy]; 1855–56) * Ivan the Fool: A Lost Opportunity (1863) * Polikushka (1863) * The Prisoner in the Caucasus (Кавказский Пленник [Kavkazskii Plennik]; 1872) * Strider: The Story of a Horse (1864, 1886) * How Much Land Does a Man Need?

(Много ли человеку земли нужно [Mnogo li cheloveku zemli nuzhno]; 1886) * Master and Man (1895) * Father Sergius (Отец Сергий [Otets Sergii] (1898) Plays * The Power of Darkness (Власть тьмы [Vlast' t'my] (tragedy, 1886) * The Fruits of Enlightenment (comedy, 1889) * The Living Corpse (Живой труп [Zhivoi trup] (1900) Non-fiction * A Confession (Исповедь [Ispoved']; 1882) * What I Believe (also called My Religion) (В чём моя вера [V chem moya vera]; 1884) (What I Believe and My Religion available at Wikisource) * What Is to Be Done?

(1886) * The Kingdom of God is Within You (Царство Божие внутри вас [Tsarstvo Bozhiye vnutri vas]; 1894) (available at wikisource) * The Gospel in Brief (1896) * What Is Art? (1897)

Question: The 2009 biographical film The Last Station starring Christopher Plummer and Helen Mirren is about the last year in the life of which literary figure who died in 1910 at Astapovo train station?
Answer: Leo Tolstoy