Anna Karenina (movie)

A film's music is often considered a character itself, and this season the roles composers have to play aren't getting any easier. Talking about love between the emotionally unstable is one thing, but how, for instance, does that sound? Or when a...

L.A. Times book critic David L. Ulin went to see "Gatz" last weekend -- that's a live stage version of F. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby." Ulin's review is forthcoming in the L.A. Times, but he gives us a preview of his thoughts -- and then we...

Anna Karenina, this week's featured adaptation, is dividing the critics. Shallow, overblown eye candy? Faithful retelling of Tolstoy's tale of doomed lovers? You'll have to judge this one for yourself. But don't be surprised if you get an argument,...

Steven Spielberg is the premier film director of his generation. When he turns his creative spotlight on major historical events, he has no equal. In "Saving Private Ryan" and "Schindler's List," he brought forth the reality of World War II like no...

For most of "Les Misérables," things do not go well for Fantine. Abandoned by the father of her child, she goes on a long spiral down the economic ladder and winds up working in a brothel. And although she's always featured with a splash of color in the...

Writer-director Andrea Arnold made "Red Road" and "Fish Tank," two frank and exceptional portraits of emotionally isolated young women hurtling, dangerously, into their futures. These character studies, set in Scotland and England, respectively,...

Director Joe Wright's vision for the Leo Tolstoy classic "Anna Karenina" has been called "bold," "daring" and "ambitious" — words that could also be used to describe the effect the director and his leading lady, Keira Knightley, have on each other....

Oscar season means hopefuls in the race for the trophies make their faces seen around town, and that doesn't mean just for film academy voters or the press. Case in point: Actress Keira Knightley and director Robert Zemeckis both have films that have...

In developing his film adaptation of "Anna Karenina," the classic Tolstoy novel about a scandalous love triangle in Imperial Russia, director Joe Wright found himself donning his sleuthing cap. "It’s kind of like detective work, trying to figure...

This holiday season may be the greatest ever for book adaptations, and this week, we have a visual stunner: "Life of Pi," Ang Lee's take on the best-selling Yann Martel novel. Among the other big adaptations is "Lincoln," the Steven Spielberg movie that...

Truly, all the world's a stage in director Joe Wright's "Anna Karenina," a new adaptation of the Tolstoy classic about high-society scandal in 19th century Imperial Russia. In making the film, which stars Keira Knightley and Jude Law, Wright took the bold...

At the art house this weekend, moviegoers preferred modern-day Philadelphia to 19th-century Russia. The quirky dramedy "Silver Linings Playbook" and the period drama "Anna Karenina" both debuted in limited release this weekend, but the former film...