THESE YOU HAVE LOVED

Tom Halliwell explores the fascination of David Lean's interpretation of the Boris Pasternak Novel published in 1957 - slated by some critics - the film in his view remains a cinematic masterpiece. Filmed largely in Spain and Finland  - in Panavision  - with an hypnotic score by Maurice Jarre, the rippling currents of the Balalaika echo the heart strings of the romantic leads

Geraldine Chaplin plays Zhivago's worthy if dull wife. Rod Steiger is the bullying schemer Lara's first lover - Tom Courtenay is Lara's fiancé - but leaves her to re-invent himself into Strelnikov - the Bolshevik general.

Like most 20 years old males in 1965 I was transfixed by Julie Christie's screen presence and in consequence allowed the gaping holes in the story line to go unnoticed. The film is over long at three and a quarter hours - Robert Bolt had the mammoth task of condensing Pasternack's sprawling novel into something manageable. The superb photography by F.A Young is equally matched by the peerless score from the then young French Composer Maurice Jarre. The winning combination of a stellar cast, acres of false snow, and memorable music ensured that the film was an enormous commercial success. But the critics were unkind: ' a long hall along the road of synthetic lyricism' - 'stately, respectable and dead - neither the contemplative Zhivago - nor the flow of events is intelligible' 

The film was shot in Panavision - in which process the image is photographed on 70mm negative and either printed normally on 70mm for projection or squeezed anamorphically onto 35mm positives for projection in theatres not equipped for 70mm projection. The Oxford Companion to Film tells me that 'purer definition is gained by this process than by anamorphic photography directly on to a 35mm negative' - no doubt a technical reader can tell us why this should be

The film opens before a vast modern dam - a triumph of Socialist engineering - Zhivago's brother (Alec Guinness) finds Lara and Zhivago's love child (Rita Tushingham) and relates the story of his brother's life to her ... Zhivago was an orphan and adopted by Alexander (Ralph Richardson) and his wife - Zhivago meets Lara - then Komarovski's lover at a ball where she wounds the bully with a pistol, but they part in the chaos of a Bolshevik rebellion. years later they meet and the suppressed passion erupts with Zhivago torn between his wife and Lara only to find the exigencies of war part them yet again, and he dies alone in a Moscow street clutching after the image of the woman he believes to be Lara. 

Julie Christie - born 1940 first widely noticed in Billy Liar (1963) - poised and modern - she seemed out of key in Farenheit 451  - but was stunning in Far From the Madding Crowd and Don't Look Now - 1973

Producer: Carlo Ponti:

Script Robert Bolt - source writer: Boris Pasternak

Cinematographer : Freddie Young

Editor: Norman Savage

Composer: Maurice Jarre

Production

Designer: John Boxart director

Julie Christie (Lara Antipova)

Geraldine Chaplin (Tonya)

Rod Steiger (Komarovsky)

Alec Guinness (Gen. Yevgraf Zhivago)

Tom Courtenay (Pasha/Strelnikov)

Siobhan McKenna (Anna)

Ralph Richardson (Alexander Gromeko)

Rita Tushingham (The Girl)

Jeffrey Rockland (Sasha)

Bernard Kay (Bolshevik)

Klaus Kinski (Kostoyed)

Gérard Tichy (Liberius)

Noel Willman (Razin)

Geoffrey Keen (Professor Kurt)

Adrienne Corri (Amelia)

Jack MacGowran (Petya)

Mark Eden (Engineer at Dam)

Erik Chitty (Old Soldier)

Roger Maxwell (Beef-Faced Colonel)

Wolf Frees (Delegate)

Gwen Nelson (Female Janitor)

Lucy Westmore (Katya)

Lili Muráti (Train Jumper)

Peter Madden (Political Officer)

Inigo Jackson (Major)

Gerhard Jersch (David)

Assad Bahador (Colonel of Dragoons)

José Nieto (Priest)

Ricardo Palacios (Extra)

Virgilio Teixeira (Captain)

José María Caffarel (Militiaman)

Emilio Carrer (Mr. Sventytski)

Maria Martin (Gentlewoman)

Ingrid Pitt (Extra)

Mercedes Ruiz (Tonya at 7)

Brigitte Trace (Streetwalker)

María Vico (Demented Woman)

Luana Alcañiz (Mrs. Sventytski)

Catherine Ellison (Raped Woman)

Pilar Gómez Ferrer