Review of The Last Station (2009) by Hala Z — 28 Nov 2009
The poster promises beardy, ponderous period drama, but for a fair while, "The Last Station" plays like the least Tolstoyan film anyone's ever likely to make about Tolstoy. This is Russian chamber drama a la Ray Cooney: a marital ding-dong as observed by the domestics.
.. It may be the only of this year's awards contenders in which John Sessions interrupts a scene to deliver the immortal line "I'm sorry, sir, it's time for your enema". Quite how all this is likely to play with serious-minded scholars of Russian literature, I don't know, though Plummer's Tolstoy remains a dignified and touching figure amid the hubbub.
The film becomes a staider proposition as the writer lies dying beside the railway tracks in a stationmaster's hut: this, finally, is the Tolstoy movie that poster promised, complete with wailing, black-clad extras, steam trains pulling out, and a plodding pace.
For a good hour or more, though, Hoffman's film is far livelier and funnier than it looks.
This review of The Last Station (2009) was written by Hala Z on 28 Nov 2009.
The Last Station has generally received positive reviews.
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