O Idiota

This impressive dramatization and realisation of one of Dostoievsky's greatest novels only covers the first part of the book - evidently the sequel was never made. But just this highly dramatic introducing part of the novel is quite enough for a film, which director and screenwriter Ivan Pyrev probably realised and let it be at that. It is very theatrical, but the great dramatisation crowded with exaggerations, almost like in a silent film, only serve to enhance the humanity, the passions, the emotion and the extreme sensitivity of Dostoievsky's novel, which he himself regarded as his best favourite. The acting couldn't have been better, particularly the main characters Anastasia Filippovna, Rogozhin, Myshkin and Ganya are like pulled directly out of the novel, and Dostoievsky himself would no doubt have been pleased. Even the music, in its basic nervous strings like in a passionate string quartet, serve to make this film unforgettably authentic in its fidelity to Dostoievsky in his constantly high strung and psychologically sharp and poignant mood.