Anna Karenina: A Love Story?
First of all, I only watched the movie so my opinions are based off of that.
Kiera Knightley is so pretty, she’s lovely. Also Darcy is her stupid brother, recognized him through that beard. Such a drastic change.
The opening sequence of the movie is so beautiful, captivating even. I love the way the scenes were shot. In my opinion it’s a cinematic masterpiece. The scenes move along swiftly but not too fast and they don’t drag along as first scenes usually do. We get an Introduction and the gist of the matter in a way that doesn’t overload you with useless information.
Darcy’s character is a loathsome bastard cheating on his pregnant wife with the governess of his multiple children whom it looks like the wife mostly takes responsibility for and he drops by once in a while to give them sweets and then panders off to fuck the governess. He looks like he avoids his wife as he is surprised when he unwittingly runs into her while she’s crying.
Then we find out Alexei Anna’s husband is also a no good person too but I don’t know which one is worse the one who fucks his governess or the one who seems to have no time for his son. He won’t even spare a few minutes to listen to the boy read. Good father that one. There’s a bit of foreshadowing when he asks his wife if she thinks adultery is a forgivable thing since she’s a married woman herself. The son is such an adorable shortcake by the way. On her way to Moscow to patch up her stupid brother’s marriage Anna meets a woman who doesn’t seem to care for people’s opinions on the train and I adored that interaction.
Now we meet Levin he looks rough we don’t know much about him except he is in love with a woman, God and farming that’s all.
We cut to the dinner between the loathsome bastard and Levin and we get the line that inspired me to write this. “She’s old and tired so is her body while you are still filled with such vigor”. Ahem, Mr Fucking-on-wheels, you are still filled with vigor because you’ve not even done a mite of the job your wife does. She takes care of the children with the help of the governess you sleep with, she pushed all your babies out, one fat head after another, she worries about dinner parties and hosting and all of that. Even takes care of you and you wonder why you are still filled with vigor while your wife is tired. That’s because you drained her. That’s the way it is with most women sadly.
Have I said before that I love how the scenes are shot. The movie is shot like an onstage play and it is just magnificent.
A few scenes later and I finally register the idiot’s name Stiva. Apparently the countess Anna met earlier is Count Vronsky’s mother. Yeah there’s a Count Vronsky character. He was finally seen for the first time as Levin was leaving after Kitty turned him down. His entrance wasn’t that momentous it was almost like Levin didn’t know what to make of him except not like him of course.
I finally see Dolly’s(the one who is being cheated on) face and I say this without any inkling of sympathy or prejudice towards her situation, the woman is ethereal she’s beautiful even when she’s crying, which she seems to do a lot. Anna gives some empty placating words and it angers me to my core. She asks Dolly to accept her fate and the very sensible woman married to a not so sensible man says why should I accept my fate I didn’t even do anything which made me pause the movie to come write this line.
It’s appalling how Anna comes to mend things between a cheating husband and his wife and she is friendly and hugging with her brother, talking about some man she has just met. They even banter while the wife gets some waterboarding and guilt tripping that if she truly loves her husband she should forgive him. Meanwhile the man doesn’t even love her anymore he said and I quote “I loved her to insanity” emphasis on loved people. She even makes a pregnant woman serve her tea, no hug too.
There was gory scene with intestine where a train attendant person gets crushed and the way the characters turned it into spectacle made me wonder how human minds work. Keep in mind all these is supposed to be 1874 Imperial Russia. And God do I love the way this movie was directed. It’s like one giant set like a dollhouse where you can see inside every room at one and they change the background props to fit each scene and it makes me giddy, big brain energy right there. The first dance scene with Vronsky and Anna felt like a fever dream to me. Honest their whole relationship felt like a fever dream. One minute they are dancing and spinning round the room and Kitty is looking increasingly heartbroken and the next minute they are confessing love and all. The concept seems very convoluted to me maybe because sexual attraction is also a strange concept for me to understand. The sex scene is beautifully shot though. It had a hint of lewdness that signaled that it is indeed forbidden and Anna is married but who cares right? She’s in love with him to the point of insanity. Obsessed even. How can you love someone after knowing them for all of 12 minutes.
Kitty and Levin are cute though. Levin really said ILY. Almost made me swoon except the fact that their story isn’t as immersive as Vronsky and Anna. Levin is cool and all but the way he treats his brother’s wife made me feel uncomfortable there’s no open animosity if course but his disapproval is weird all the same. Kitty marries Levin and he brings her home where she proceeds to melt my heart(watch the movie please).
I must say Alexei Anna’s husband is a gray area for me. I understand that cheating is bad and Anna has no bloody excuse but sometimes his self righteous attitude makes my want to shove one of his glasses up his ass. He does turn out to be a somewhat good person at the end of the movie though seeing as he takes care of his wife’s daughter. At least that’s what I thought before I fully understood the movie, so many scenes put together shows that Alexei did love his wife well as much as one can love a wife who cheats. And to add insult she cheats on him with someone with the same name.
The crux of this movie is Anna and Vronsky’s relationship and it fascinates me how these two people who are so passionate about each other don’t end up together. In my opinion both of them are selfish people and no this is not because of the cheating, it’s more because of how they loved each other. Vronsky didn’t expect that Anna would become so attached to him and he just wanted a fling with a woman so beautiful and also for how infamous it’d make him look. Anna ‘loved’ Vronsky like a child would love a shiny new toy for the first few days and only get attached because they can’t figure out how to break it open. They have this weird convoluted affair that starts breaking apart when she becomes pregnant.
Lesson is, Don’t Cheat on your husband with some sexually famous man whom you’ve heard about before you even set eyes on him. Also people would do almost anything if they believe themselves to be in love.
This week I almost burnt my ears off from listening to Fictional by Khloe Rose. It's a good song, check it out. See you next time❤
