Directed by Caspar Wrede
My rating: 2.5 stars out of 4
IMDb
(YouTube)
Solzhenitsyn's classic novel makes an uneasy transition to the screen. Tom Courtenay, a Brit with a heavy accent, is the easy going, likeable Denisovich, in his 8th year at a remote Russian prison camp in Siberia. As the title indicates, we spend one day with him, from the predawn hours until going to sleep that night. In between, he makes deals for food and tobacco, lays cinder blocks, tries to stay warm and avoid the prying eyes of the soldiers who watch over them. Unfortunately, all of this is rather boring to watch, and the only tense moment in the story is when he sneaks a shiv past a guard. Which is a shame, since Sven Nykvist provides a spectacular landscape on which next to nothing actually happens.
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