Anastasia (1956)

Most of us know little about Russian history with much of it happening prior to the Communist takeover given little attention. We hear about Rasputin and Nicholas and Alexandria but not much, at least not as much as with other royal families. The only other story to receive much attention was that of Anastasia, the supposed lost daughter of the royal family who escaped execution and survived. Or did she? Many came forward to claim they were Anastasia but none as famous as Anna Anderson. Here story was the basis for this film and several others. Her claim to be the long lost daughter lasted for decades and it wasn't until DNA results confirmed or denied her claim that the results were determined. But what we have here is a story that revolves around that possibility.Yul Brynner, fresh from his successes with THE TEN COMMANDMENTS and THE KING AND I, stars as General Sergei Pavlovich Bounine, a Russian exile in Paris of nefarious character who will do anything to possess power and money. Displaced as he is we get the impression he is not above criminal activity and has been searching for just the right person to pass off as the long lost Anastasia.It seems he has found the perfect foil for his plan, a woman who had a past involving a stay in an asylum, Anna Koureff (Ingrid Bergman). Something in her background makes it seem that she could potentially actually be the woman sought, but the odds are against it. With a bit of training and assistance Bounine intends to pass Anna off as the real thing and as a result lay partial claim to £10 million laying in an English bank, leftover funds from the royal family.The only way to accomplish this is to pass Anna off as Anastasia to the Dowager Empress Marie Fedorovona (Helen Hayes) in Copenhagen. Hers is the determining factor that will decide if Anna is in fact Anastasia or not. With so many having tried to lay claim to the title it will not be an easy task.But we have more going on here underneath the surface as Hollywood is want to do. As Bounine trains Anna the pair become close to one another. Beneath his brusque manner and treatment of Anna and her confusion as to whether or not she is who he has told her, an affection begins to grow. It's subtle, nearly not on display, but there all the more time they spend together. Whether or not the end result will involve them as a couple is in doubt but the chance is there.The movie is not quite a romance but evolves into one coupled equally with the historical retelling of the search for Anastasia. This blending of fact and fiction makes for a slow moving film but an entertaining one at the same time. The film marked a comeback of sorts for actress Bergman who had fallen out of favor due to the strict moral at the time. Having had an open affair with director Roberto Rossellini in 1950 she had been denounced and looked down upon in American society. But her talent shown through and she worked her way back into the public eye with films like this one.Once more Twilight Time has done an excellent job with the transfer on display here. I've yet to see anything delivered from them that has fallen short. And like all of their titles this one is limited to so many copies so if you're interested get one before they're gone.

I should admit first that I saw the cartoon musical remake with the voices of Meg Ryan and John Cusack before this original that I had only heard of because of the award winning lead actress, so of course I watched. Basically is has been ten years since the teenage Romanov Grand Duchess and her sisters and brother, children of the Tsar, Nicholas II, have apparently been killed. Anna Koreff (Oscar and Golden Globe winning Ingrid Bergman) is the orphaned woman who has no memory of where she came from, turning up in Paris and found by General Sergei Pavlovich Bounine (Yul Brynner) who is very keen on the £10,000,000 inheritance. What starts out as training to become a convincing Anastasia impostor, with her uncanny resemblance, Anna gains more confidence and style to meet what may be former familiars and imperial court members. Her big ambition to help her possibly confirm her identity, as there are many saying she really is Anastasia, is to meet Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna (Golden Globe nominated Helen Hayes) during the tour de force in Copenhagen. When Anna gets to the know fortune hunting Prince Paul Von Haraldberg (Ivan Desny) we see Bounine getting jealous, and everything comes down to a grand ball where he tries to convince the Empress to meet the lady he has found. The Empress does have a private word with Anna, she is obviously confident that she is another impostor wanting to inherit the fortune she is owed, as the only living Tsar sibling, but as a conversation develops Anna does reveal remembering many things from her past that the Empress recognises, and only she would know. In the end, supposedly the Empress confirms that Anna truly is the living Anastasia, and although she is seen in the arms of Price Haraldberg and not Bounine, it is a seemingly happy ending because everything has been settled. Also starring Akim Tamiroff as Boris Adreivich Chernov, Martita Hunt as Baroness Elena Von Livenbaum, Felix Aylmer as Chamberlain, Sacha Pitoëff as Piotr Ivanovich Petrovin, Natalie Schafer as Irina Lissemskaia, Grégoire Gromoff as Stepan and Karel Stepanek as Mikhail Vlados. Bergman does give a good award worthy performance (she won against Deborah Kerr in The King and I, ironically starring Oscar winning Bryner), the story is a little confusing in moments, and I may have drifted off slightly, but it is a rather watchable period drama. It was nominated the Oscar for Best Music for Alfred Newman, and it was nominated the BAFTA for Best British Screenplay. Very good!

Not my favorite Ingrid Bergman movie, although her acting was very good here. Yul Brynner was quite good as the semi-villain who eventually re-orders his priorities. And there is an interesting undertone of the Pygmalion story in this film. The historical inaccuracy is huge, but of course that wasn't the goal of the filmmakers, so that isn't a completely fair criticism. Now that Anastasia Nikolayevna's bones have been found and identified, there isn't that much story here, but of course that wasn't known at the time. The intent was to bring a popular Broadway play to the screen, and although I never saw the play, I suspect that it was a bang-up job.

Critics were too quick to applaud this musty adaptation of Marcelle Maurette's play starring Ingrid Bergman as a rag-woman picked by crafty businessman Yul Brynner to be groomed into Russian royalty Anastasia, a Duchess long though deceased. Helen Hayes is exceptionally good as the cautious Dowager Maria, whom Ingrid must work hard to convince, however Bergman herself (despite winning a Best Actress Oscar for this 'comeback' performance) is mannered, and she has no on-screen rapport with Brynner whatsoever. As a result, the romantic underpinnings of the story do not come off, and the thin plot keeps going after all its pieces have already come into play. The production is appropriately opulent, but the film isn't especially moving or memorable. ** from ****