Anna Karenina; Love is A Curse.

hello, peeps!

I'm back again here after took some days for my holidays. I was thinking about making a review of this colossal movie I just watched. Anna Karenina. do you guys know her? or her name seems so familiar to you whom interested in the world of literary?

yep, Anna Karenina is Leo Tolstoy's legendary novel. a story which made Tolstoy met his turning point in the world of literature, after his book War and Peace (source:google). I was searching through cyberspace to get the book, but sadly I couldn't find it anywhere in my country. maybe later, when its being reprinted or in the second-hand bookstore. interested with Tolstoy's writings after I read one of his book, A Confession, I was being enchanted by his words. they said, Tolstoy was a legendary author and writer among the world of literature. that fact, makes me want to know about this Anna Karenina's story. and here I am, enchanted by those beautiful words, tragic love story, and what I can say is this story was as tragic as Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet. no wonder, it became a legend.

this story was originally a series, published from 1873 to 1877 in The Russian Messenger, based on Tolstoy's negative views of Russian volunteers who was going to fight in Serbia. turned out one of the main character was one of those volunteers, but he denied to go to Serbia because of one reason, that was "love".

                                      

(left: Keira Knightley as Anna Karenina; Right: Aaron Taylor Johnson as Alexei Vronsky)
the story began with a women, Countess Anna Arkadyevna Karenina, a wife of Count Alexei Alexandrovich Karenin and a mother to Sergei "Seryozha" Alexeyich Karenin, she has a happy life, perfect position, and every single one in St. Petersburgh adores her because she's one of the aristocratic family and had a really great manner. she had just only one lack from her marriage, there's no love between Anna and Alexei Karenin and those marriage turned out to be cold, eventhough they were already had a son. Anna married to Alexei Karenin when she was only eighteen years old.

one day, she had to left the house for the very first time to Moscow, she couldn't bring her husband because he's so busy, and decided to left her son too. she had to save her brother's (Prince Stepan Arkadyevich Oblonsky) marriage because of Prince Stepan's affair with a housemaid. the moment when she arrived at the train station in Moscow, accidentally she met Count Alexei Kirillovich Vronsky, a cavalry officer. they feel attracted to each other. unfortunately, Alexei Vronsky had a relationship with Anna's younger sister of sister-in-law, Princess Ekaterina Alexandrovna Shcherbatskaya (Kitty), and Anna heard that Alexei Vronsky want to proposed to Kitty at the ball. the night at the ball, Alexei Vronsky asked Anna to dance with him, and every single thing happened afterward. on the other side, there was a man who truly fall in love with Kitty with his fullest sincere heart, he was Konstatin Dmitrievich Levin, and it was such a true love between those two.

Anna, whom never felt the love from her husband and the marriage, lost herself in the feeling of love and lust with Vronsky. on the other side, Vronsky felt the same about Anna. they lost in forbidden love and lust, as long as they're happy about it, as long as they have each other. they had beautiful and happy life for a while, just the two of them. then the problem came, when their relationship being shaken by the people who wondered what was between those two and Anna's marriage status with Alexei Karenin. it's a humiliation for an aristocrat family to have an affair, eventhough the courageous Anna willing to be a widow for Vronsky's sake. but being a widow in those century was a disgrace, her life would destroyed, her social life, position, even she didn't have the human rights anymore. Anna, fell in love so deeply with Vronsky, can't choose between her social-aristocratic life and her love-life, she's been confused with herself and started to blaming her fate.

the story ended up tragically. it was a breath-taking moment when I saw Anna's last choice. Anna and Vronsky's love were indeed a beautiful love story, but at the same time, it was a curse for her. in my opinion, Alexei Karenin was a really great and mature man (his age gap with Anna is twenty years apart), eventhough he didn't love Anna and kept the marriage just for his social life and maintain his name as an aristocrat family member, but he had a really good and sincere heart inside or maybe that's because he's a priest. he forgave Anna and Vronsky, he raised their daughter as he raised his son. beside that, Alexei Karenin said that he was so lucky that he never felt "love", because it was a curse as he saw from Anna and Vronsky's case. such a sincere yet lonely heart Alexei Karenin's had.

it was such a really great movie with so many messages implied in it. I usually don't like a colossal movie, but this one was exceptional. I have to said it once more, no wonder it became a legendary. it had beautiful cinematography, great words of dialogues, amazing costumes, theatrical scenes, and best actress indeed. not to mention, Keira Knightley's british accent made it way more beautiful! I really really recommend this movie to you all peeps, if you're a romance lover. this story surely will blow your mind, and make you fantasizing about your own love story. the value of social-life and judgement being lifted up, importance from the views of society.

so, okay, this post was a really long post, because I just fell in love with every single thing in Anna Karenina's story. I'm gonna search the book, as soon as possible. I was so curious about the original ones and two hours of movie didn't really pay my curiousness of Anna Karenina's complete story. hope you enjoy my review of Anna Karenina movie.

see you until next post, peeps!

credit picture : pinterest.

XOXO,