The divided state: Psychological disunity in 'Anna Karenina'
2013; Issue: 71 Linguagem: Inglês
ISSN
1449-857X
Autores Tópico(s)Gothic Literature and Media Analysis
ResumoIn The Seven Basic Plots, Christopher Booker identifies a psychological crisis in the tragedy narrative: the id's conflict with the social forces of 'loyalty, friendship and love'. This suggestion invokes a complicated set of questions about the tragedy genre: can an individual sustain psychological stability when socially isolated? Will psychological disunity inevitably lead to social disorder? Can the individual be connected to the id and still maintain his or her responsibilities to friends, family and loved ones? Joe Wright's Anna Karenina (2012) reveals the psychological dangers of egocentrism to the tragic character. The latest in a long line of adaptations of the nineteenth-century novel by Leo Tolstoy, Wright's film suggests that the relationship between social forces and the individual's psychology has the potential for both constructiveness and destructiveness over psychological stability. This is evident chiefly in the distinctive visual cues that accompany its two protagonists, Anna Karenina (Keira Knightley) and Constantine Dmitrievich Levin (Domhnall Gleeson). It is visually embodied in the aggressively disparate settings: the 'authentic' external locations for the Russian countryside, and a soundstage, which signifies the colder, crueller worlds of Moscow and Saint Petersburg. According to the interview feature 'A Russian Revolution', the film was shot at these visually distinct locations to stress the psychological opposition between the tragic Anna and the ultimately fulfilled, 'authentic' Levin. In this respect, the filmmakers intended to articulate the importance of a balanced ego over the excesses of the id.
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