A seven-hour epic adaptation of the novel by Leo Tolstoy. The love story of young Countess Natasha Rostova and Count Pierre Bezukhov is interwoven with the Great Patriotic War of 1812 against Napoleon's invading army.
Though it can be bombastic and mind-numbing, it's often lively and eye filling.
– Jonathan Rosenbaum,
Chicago Reader,
1 Jun 2007
fresh:
Considering its cost and the vast effort that went into its making, such a film can be made only once in our time. The wonder, indeed, is that it was made at all.
– Roger Ebert,
Chicago Sun-Times,
1 Jun 2007
fresh:
This is the barbaric yawp of the Soviet film industry circa 1968, an entertainment A-bomb test announcing to the world: 'Here is what we are capable of.'
– Nick Pinkerton,
Village Voice,
16 Oct 2007
fresh:
Exhaustive, spectacular, often dazzling in its ambition and faithfulness to Tolstoy, the movie is still regarded as one of the wonders of epic cinema.