anna karenina 1948 movie review

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Anna Karenina

Critics reviews, audience reviews, cast & crew.

Julien Duvivier

Vivien Leigh

Ralph Richardson

Alexei Karenin

Kieron Moore

Count Vronsky

Hugh Dempster

Stefan Oblonsky

Mary Kerridge

Dolly Oblonsky

Life is but a stage, and Anna a player upon it

Anna Karenina and Madame Bovary are two of the most notorious fallen women in literature. Karenina is prepared to lose all the advantages of high society in favor of the man she loves. Bovary abandons the man who loves her in an attempt to climb socially. As portrayed by Leo Tolstoy and Gustave Flaubert , both women are devastated by the prices they pay.

These are two of the great roles for many actresses and irresistible challenges for many filmmakers. There have been more than a dozen film versions of Karenina, most famously by Greta Garbo (1927 and 1935) and Vivien Leigh ; almost as many of Bovary, notably by Isabelle Huppert , Jennifer Jones and Pola Negri ( Mia Wasikowska will play her next year).

I mention these details to ask myself: What makes the two roles so enticing that every good actress must sooner or later read the novels and start to daydream? Both are mothers who essentially choose to abandon their single children. Both are the center of attention and gossip within their own circles. Both use opera houses as a stage for their affairs. Both pay dearly for their adulteries. The big difference is that Karenina is driven by sincere passion, and Bovary by selfishness and greed. Karenina inspires pity, Bovary gets what she deserves.

In Joe Wright's daringly stylized new version of "Anna Karenina," he returns for the third time to use Keira Knightley as his heroine. She is almost distractingly beautiful here and elegantly gowned to an improbable degree. One practical reason for that: As much as half of Wright's film is staged within an actual theater and uses not only the stage but the boxes and even the main floor — with seats removed — to present the action. We see the actors in the wings, the stage machinery, the trickery with backdrops, horses galloping across in a steeplechase.

All the world's a stage, and we but players on it. Yes, and particularly in Karenina's case, because she fails to realize how true that is. She makes choices that are unacceptable in the high society of St. Petersburg and Moscow, and behaves as if they were invisible. She doesn't seem to realize the audience is right there and paying close attention. She believes she can flaunt the rules and get away with it.

When we meet her, she is the pretty young wife of the important government minister Karenin ( Jude Law ). He is affectionate, but dry and remote. The love she lacks for him she lavishes on their 8-year-old son. At the train station to meet Dolly, the wife of her brother, Count Oblonsky (Matthew Macfadyen), she sees the dashing young officer Vronsky ( Aaron Taylor-Johnson ), and for both of them, it's love at first sight. He seems very young and perhaps not schooled in society's rules. She should know better.

All society appears in public at the opera and grand balls (both staged by Wright in the theater), and after Anna and Vronsky meet at a ball, the die is cast. In this film, Wright and his screenwriter, Tom Stoppard , make adequate room for a landowner named Levin ( Domhnall Gleeson ), who for Tolstoy was the third major character and certainly the most attractive. Levin represents Tolstoy's ideas in the novel: He is for abolishing serfdom and liberating his own serfs and has a near-mystical bond with the land and its cultivation.

He hopes to marry Kitty ( Alicia Vikander ), who has a crush on Vronsky, but at the ball, Vronsky has eyes only for Anna, and the outcome is happiness for Kitty and Levin.

Anna's husband is not blind and soon knows about her affair. He is very firm. If they continue (affairs are not unknown in their circle), she must be discreet and secretive. Anna's heart is too aflame to conceal her love with Vronsky, and she pays the price of separation from her husband and her beloved son. Society is satisfied. She has sinned, and she has been punished. Her punishment is far from over, and the lesson she dearly learns is that passion may be temporary, but scandal is permanent.

This is a sumptuous film — extravagantly staged and photographed, perhaps too much so for its own good. There are times when it is not quite clear if we are looking at characters in a story or players on a stage. Productions can sometimes upstage a story, but when the story is as considerable as "Anna Karenina," that can be a miscalculation.

Roger Ebert

Roger Ebert was the film critic of the Chicago Sun-Times from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, he won the Pulitzer Prize for distinguished criticism.

Anna Karenina

• Keira Knightley as Anna
• Aaron Taylor-Johnson as Vronsky
• Jude Law as Karenin
• Alicia Vikander as Kitty
• Matthew MacFadyen as Oblonsky
• Domhnall Gleeson as Levin

Directed by

• Tom Stoppard

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Anna karenina (1948): a review.

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Anna karenina.

Directed by Julien Duvivier

Vivien Leigh in the most magnificent love story ever written!

Stefan and Dolly Oblonsky have had a spat and Stefan has asked his sister, Anna Karenina, to come down to Moscow to help mend the rift. Anna's companion on the train from St. Petersburg is Countess Vronsky who is met at the Moscow station by her son. Col. Vronsky looks very dashing in his uniform and it's love at first sight when he looks at Anna and their eyes meet.

Vivien Leigh Ralph Richardson Kieron Moore Hugh Dempster Mary Kerridge Marie Lohr Frank Tickle Sally Ann Howes Niall MacGinnis Michael Gough Martita Hunt Heather Thatcher Helen Haye Mary Martlew Ruby Miller

Director Director

Julien Duvivier

Producers Producers

Alexander Korda Herbert Mason

Writers Writers

Guy Morgan Jean Anouilh Julien Duvivier

Original Writer Original Writer

Leo Tolstoy

Casting Casting

Dorothy Holloway

Editor Editor

Russell Lloyd

Cinematography Cinematography

Henri Alekan

Assistant Director Asst. Director

Mickey Delamar

Camera Operator Camera Operator

Robert Walker

Art Direction Art Direction

Andrej Andrejew Wilfred Shingleton

Special Effects Special Effects

Ned Mann W. Percy Day Cliff Richardson

Composer Composer

Constant Lambert

Sound Sound

John Cox Red Law Bert Ross

Costume Design Costume Design

Cecil Beaton

Makeup Makeup

Harold Fletcher

Hairstyling Hairstyling

Helen Penfold

London Films Productions

Primary Language

Spoken languages.

English Italian

Releases by Date

22 jan 1948, 23 jan 1948, releases by country.

• Theatrical 12

139 mins   More at IMDb TMDb Report this page

Popular reviews

Review by eely ✨ ★★★★

vivien was born to play anna but I cannot forgive this movie’s interpretation of levin as some old guy in a field who is literally only in three scenes and has like two lines

Review by Zegan ★★★½

Rest in peace Vivien Leigh, you're one of the most wonderful actresses in cinema history.

Review by Jim Beaver ★★★★½

Leo Tolstoy's acclaimed novel of an illicit love affair and the pain it brings to many people has been filmed more than two dozen times (including twice with Greta Garbo). Here, in director Julien Duvivier's adaptation written by himself, Jean Anouilh, and Guy Morgan, the tale is told exquisitely, with enormous taste, visual splendor, and superb performances. Vivien Leigh is subtle and intensely moving as the adulterous Anna, whose loveless marriage and beloved child are sacrificed to an overwhelming passion. Speaking of passion, that which is exhibited in the astonishing stillness of Ralph Richardson's performance is no less powerful for all its repression. As the cuckolded husband, Richardson is cruel yet deeply, hiddenly, wounded. Together, Leigh and Richardson make clear…

Review by 𝑨𝒏𝒈𝒆𝒍𝒊𝒄𝒂 ★★★★

Vivien I love you :(

Review by Sarah ★★

The Anna Karenina adaptation that time forgot.

I'll admit it: I haven't read it. I'm a subliterate she-ape. I don't even own a book! (I'm sitting less than six feet from my copy of Anna Karenina , purchased not so long ago with only the best of intentions and for the agreeable price of $0.50. Someday, little book.)

I had to acquaint myself with the basics of the novel after I watched Duvivier's 1948 adaptation, because I really had a hard time understanding character motivations and wanted to know how it was "supposed" to be. Is Vronsky supposed to be a complete dullard? Are we supposed to celebrate his and Anna's romance? The story in the film seems to falter between…

Review by kylie ★★★

Vivien Leigh is the only woman ever

Review by 𝓛𝔂𝓵𝓪🕊️ ★★★½

please let me know if there’s a movie out there where vivien leighs character has a happy ending im begging

Review by Isabelle ★★★★½

i tried watching the earlier (1935) version w/ garbo in it but for me it just didn't encapsulate the personality and conflicts anna faces as splendidly as vivien leigh does in this. although at times this film can be stilted and has some poor choice of lasting (particularly for vronsky and levin imo) the most outstanding feature is vivien's expressive performance in this, recalling to mind other similarly powerful and tragic roles such as myra in waterloo bridge and blanche in a streetcar named desire! the last scene was particularly heart wrenching!! in my (albeit slightly biased) opinion she is the best anna so far.

Review by lizzie ★★★★

It's been 84 years and I finally found the full 2 hour 13 minute cut of the film (no, I don't have Criterion, so if any sugar daddy and or Ms. Hamisham-esque figure who would like to fund my obsession hmu)

I love Vivien Leigh more than anything. Would this be watchable without her? Probably not. For me, her screen presence alone totally elevates the film in a way that no one else could.

Ok, earnest review over. Gonna go cry in a corner

Review by anna🌙 ★★★

Vivien Leigh lights up every single movie she's in

Review by Jim Dooley ★★★★ 4

A few years ago, I finally read the Leo Tolstoy novel and it became one of my favorite books.  Since that time, I have seen a number of filmed versions ... none of which capture the massive breadth of the novel, which is to be expected.  This one is my favorite version, though.      Before seeing this movie, I knew nothing about the Director, Julien Duvivier.  He certainly had a great deal of talent, especially in using the expressions of his performers to capture not only their emotions, but also the occurrences happening around them.  For instance, we do not need to see Vronsky’s spill during the horse race.  The detail is all in Anna’s face.  A friend told…

Review by gwen ★★★★ 1

This entire film felt like a love letter of some sort despite it's tragedy. Everything that Vivien Leigh touches feels and becomes so personal. It's why I always look forward to seeing her on my screen, and why I stand by my opinion that she should have been given the chance to do more movies.

On another note, I did not expect the kind of production this film had. Amazing set and design, costumes, score, and acting (Well, except maybe the guy who plays Vronsky)

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