War and Peace (1956)
Average Rating: 4.8/10
Reviews Counted: 5
Fresh: 2 | Rotten: 3
No consensus yet.
Average Rating: N/A
Critic Reviews: 1
Fresh: 0 | Rotten: 1
liked it
Average Rating: 3.5/5
User Ratings: 7,558
My Rating
Movie Info
War and Peace is a commendable attempt to boil down Tolstoy's long, difficult novel into 208 minutes' screen time. In recreating the the social and personal upheavals attending Napoleon's 1812 invasion of Russia, $6 million was shelled out by coproducers Carlo Ponti, Dino de Laurentiis and Paramount Pictures. Some of the panoramic battle sequences are so expertly handled by second-unit director Mario Soldati that they appear to be Technicolor-and-Vistavision newsreel footage of the actual
PG,
Drama, Romance, Art House & International, Classics
Bridget Boland, Robert Westerby, King Vidor, Mario Camerini, Ennio De Concini
Aug 21, 1956 Wide
Dec 3, 2002
Watch It Now
Cast
-
Audrey Hepburn
Natasha -
Henry Fonda
Pierre -
Mel Ferrer
Prince Andrei Bolkonsky -
Vittorio Gassman
Anatole -
Anita Ekberg
Helene -
Oscar Homolka
Gen. Mikhail Kutuzov -
Herbert Lom
Napoleon -
John Mills
Platon -
Helmut Dantine
Dolokhov -
Milly Vitale
Lise -
Barry Jones
Count Ilya Rostov -
Wilfred Lawson
Prince Nicholas Bolkons... -
Jeremy Brett
Nicholas Rostov -
Sean Barrett
Petya Rostov -
Anna Maria Ferrero
Mary Bolkonskv -
Tullio Carminatti
Kuragin -
Patrick Crean
Denisov -
Gertrude Flynn
Peronskaya -
Marisa Allasio
Matriosa -
Vincent Barbi
Balaga -
Georges Brehat
French Officer at Execu... -
Guido Celano
Napoleon's Officer -
-
Bob Cunningham
Pierre's Second at Duel -
-
Mino Doro
Russian General -
Andre Eszterhazy
Dolokhov's Second -
Andrea Fantasia
Constand -
Charles Fawcett
Russian Artillery Capta... -
John Horne
Old Gentleman Dancing w... -
Clelia Matania
Mlle. Georges -
Enrico Olivieri
French Drummer -
-
Alfredo Rizzo
Soldiers During the Ros... -
Giacomo Rossi-Stuart
Young Cossack -
Lea Seidl
Countess Rostov -
Robert Stephens
Officers Talking with N... -
Gualtiero Tumiati
Pierre's Father -
Joop van Hulzen
Russian Officer -
Michael Billingsley
Russian Soldier -
Gilberto Tofano
Young Dying Soldier -
Teresa Pellati
Masa -
Cesare Barbetti
Young Boy -
-
-
-
-
-
Marianna Leibl
Servant at Bolkonsky's -
Alberto Carlo Lolli
Rostov's Major-Domo -
Piero Palermini
Russian Artillery Lieut... -
Umberto Sacripante
Old Man -
-
Michael Tor
Pope -
Maria Zanoli
Mayra -
Stephen Lang
Tichon -
Richard Macnamara
De Beausset -
Paul Davis
Young French Officer
ADVERTISEMENT
All Critics (9) | Top Critics (3) | Fresh (2) | Rotten (3) | DVD (8)
Alas, the human stories that Tolstoy told so significantly in the book are sketchy and inconsequential, despite the time devoted to them.
Top CriticSpectacle galore starring Hepburn and Fonda.
Audience Reviews for War and Peace
Super Reviewer
Super Reviewer
Discussion Forum
| Topic | Last Post | Replies |
|---|---|---|
| Mature audiences will enjoy this movie | 4 months ago | 0 |
What's Hot On RT
The Last Stand, Side Effects
Trailer for James Franco adaptation
Rachel McAdams' time travel romantic drama
Blockbusters ranked!
Featured on RT
- Ranking the Blockbusters with Summer Movie Scorecard 2013 0
- RT on DVD & Blu-Ray: The Last Stand and Side Effects 7
- Box Office Guru Wrapup: Star Trek Softer Than Expected at #1 81
- Weekly Ketchup: Will Smith to Star in Wild Bunch Remake? 37
- Critics Consensus: Star Trek Into Darkness is Certified Fresh 106
- Red Carpet Roundup: Star Trek Into Darkness Edition 0
- Video Interviews with Katie Aselton & Lake Bell of Black Rock 2
Top Headlines
-
Alex Gibney Talks We Steal Secrets: The Story of Wikileaks
0
-
RED Screenwriters Returning for RED 3
0
-
Brave's Brenda Chapman Talks Merida Makeover Controversy
0
-
Gold Discovers Spike Lee
1
-
Morgan Freemand and Diane Keaton Team Up for Life Itself
0
-
The Ten O'Clock People Are Counting on Chris Evans
0
-
Marton Csokas in Talks for The Equalizer
0
Fresh Links
Featured
Star Trek Movies Ranked
HitFix offers their own take on the worst-to-best of the Enterprise crew's cinematic adventures.
Top 10 Star Trek Villains
Rolling Stone unveils the Enterprise's most irksome adversaries.
Celebrity Yearkbook Flashback
We'll bet you never realized how many stars were cheerleaders and high school athletes!
50 Most Classic Movie Moms
In celebration of Mother's Day, TimeOut offers up 50 iconic matriarchs from the big screen.
Weirdest Movie Siblings
From Twins to The Royal Tenenbaums, Moviefone explores cinema's oddest siblings.
Promos
Follow RT on Twitter!
Spice up your feed with hourly Tomatometer updates!
Foreign Titles
- War and Peace (1956) (DE)
- War and Peace (1956) (UK)
This is not a film but a monument, a tribute, a love letter of Cliff's Notes to Tolstoy's novel. Though I must confess that I have yet to read the book, I can see lurking beneath the melodrama of the film Tolstoy's sharp characters and moral dilemmas. Tolstoy is so sharp a writer and such a master of inner monologue that no film could get inside the heads of these characters like his prose, and there lies the film's weakness. But despite its medium and the film's flaws, what lies beneath unfolds in fits and starts. And what fits and starts they are. The need for war but the reasonable repulsion of it, the dalliance of youth and the practiced certitude of adulthood, and the question of what makes militaries and states great are all themes that emerge if only in abstractions in King Vidor's epic film.
Overall, this is an ambitious project that fails because it cannot capture all the goals its source material sets, but it succeeds sublimely sometimes.