Seven stars. A reasonably good print is available on YouTube. So I watched it last
night. Sean Connery and Claire Bloom are both excellent. That's why it even
gets seven stars. After that, things gets a little thin. Jack Watling (Stiva)
and Albert Lieven (Karenin) do solid, if unremarkable work. The rest of the
roles are played as bad 1-D cartoons. Yes, it's 60-year old TV work. But it's
BBC. They could (and did) do better than this. I've never read the novel, but
it's obvious that this 108 minute version leaves a TON of stuff out. It has to
focus very tightly on the highlights of the Karenina/Vronsky story, and that is
executed well. I'm a huge Sean Connery fan -- I'll watch him in anything. And
I love watching his pre-Bond roles because there's a quality of innocence about them that he lost after he became a huge star. He was
already a significant
screen actor in Britain by 1961, but still only an occasional supporting player
in Hollywood. Here he shows the elegance and physical power that are the key
to making his Bond work so well. And Bloom is radiant as the doomed Anna.
It's a joy, given Connery's recent passing, and his retirement in the early
aughts, that Bloom is still a working actor into her 90s. People like her and
Peter Vaughn are reminders that time changes our options, but can still allow
us moments of brilliance well into our old age. This is very much worth your time
if you are a fan of either Connery or Bloom. 1 July 2021.
