The Brothers Karamazov

A film adapted from Dostoevsky's novel. The Karamazov family has a father and three sons. Fyodor, the father, is miserly, given to pleasure and openly at odds with his sons. The eldest, Dmitri, is out of the army, in debt and angry; the middle son Ivan is rational and without faith; the youngest, Alyosha, is at a monastery. Two things are at the centre of the conflict: the inheritance and a woman named Grushenka. Father and eldest son want the same woman, and the question of money turns into a personal account because of it. Dmitri threatens his father, and does it in front of everyone. When the father is killed the suspect is obvious. The second half is the investigation and the trial. The matter the narrative keeps is whose the guilt is: the difference between the person who acts and the person who thinks it, wants it or permits it. The novel argues this at length; the film carries part of the argument and leaves part outside. Yul Brynner plays Dmitri, Lee J. Cobb the father, Maria Schell plays Grushenka and Richard Basehart plays Ivan. Claire Bloom is in the cast. Richard Brooks directed and wrote it. It was made under Hollywood studio conditions; the colour and the wide sets build a place quite unlike the air of the novel. A comprehensive choice for anyone who likes adaptations of classic novels. For a viewer expecting fidelity, the film shortens the philosophical sections greatly and changes the ending.