Search
What's Hot
Day-by-Day Fall Schedule
Your Dancing All-Stars Picks
Mary-Kate Olsen's New Beau
Shows We Lost This Year

We The Living

1942, Movie, NR, 174 mins

We The Living: Review

starstarstarstar
They don't make films like this anymore. First shown in Italy in 1942, but banned by Mussolini's government and lost until it was rediscovered and re-edited (after an intensive search by the producers), WE THE LIVING has a syrupy score, misty photography, melodramatic confrontations, heroic renunciations, and suicides in the name of lost ideals. And it works. An adaptation of Ayn Rand's novel, the film mixes lots of anti-Communist politics with its passion, but there's still much passion in this tale set in Russia in the early 1920s. Opposed to the new Bolshevik regime are the lovers Kira Argounova (Alida Valli) and Leo Kovalensky (Rossano Brazzi). When Leo is arrested and subsequently contracts tuberculosis, Kira becomes the mistress of idealistic Party man and secret police member Andrei Taganov (Fosco Giachetti) as a means of paying for Leo's stay at a sanitarium. Unfortunately, Leo repays her sacrifice by becoming as corrupt as his erstwhile oppressors, while Andrei becomes disillusioned with the government and shoots himself after finding out that Kira doesn't care for him. The film ends as Kira, still incorruptibly anti-Red, prepares to leave Russia and Leo forever. Though filled with Rand's predictable dogma, WE THE LIVING is unforgettably romantic, and still stands up as a moving love story and as a declaration of female independence that was way ahead of its time. The lush sets, exquisite cinematography, impeccable black-and-white values, and exceptional casting lend the proceedings much splendor, even if the splendor is preposterous. leave a comment
Are You Watching?
We The Living
Loading ...
Advertisement

Our Partners

Advertisement

Related Websites

You might be also interested in the following websites:

Most Popular TV Shows

  1. American Idol
  2. NCIS
  3. Big Bang Theory
  4. Voice
  5. Person of Interest
more popular tv shows

Most Popular Celebrities

  1. Jessica Simpson
  2. Khloe Kardashian
  3. Kate Middleton
  4. Maria Menounos
  5. Kim Kardashian
more popular celebrities

Most Popular Movies

  1. Men In Black 3
  2. Avengers
  3. Battleship
  4. The Dictator
  5. Dark Shadows
more popular movies

Top Videos

  1. Celebrity
  2. Celebrity
  3. The Bachelorette
  4. Revenge
  5. America's Got Talent
more top videos