Charles Bramesco: War and Peace: Sergei Bondarchuk’s Adaptation Is One of Film’s Great Epics: "The biggest blockbuster in Soviet history is returning to movie screens in 2019. It’s compulsively watchable—and absolutely worth seeing.... In any serious, sober-minded discussion about what could be selected to exemplify the farthest reaches of cinema’s capabilities, War and Peace—Sergei Bondarchuk’s largely unseen adaptation of Tolstoy’s literary classic—would have to be on the table. The story of its production, of a man moving heaven and Earth to realize a staggering vision, boggles the mind to this day. The adaptation set a new standard for 'epic', capturing all the passion and tragedy of Napoleon’s clash against the Russian aristocracy in its seven-hour sprawl. Anyone who hears '431 minutes of War and Peace' and imagines an airless museum exhibit passing itself off as a film has another thing coming...
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