I don't know what I expected from Doctor Zhivago (1965), but it certainly wasn't this magnificent film. The word epic hardly covers the scope and depth of the movie.

The one anachronism I had to get over quickly was the entire cast having English accents while performing Russian characters. Once I accepted that, I could revel in the splendid performances of Omar Sharif, Julie Christie, Geraldine Chaplin (daughter of Charlie Chaplin), Rod Steiger, Ralph Richardson, Alec Guinness, and Tom Courtenay (among others).

Certainly this is a romance, a love story set against the real ugliness and horror of the Bolshevik Revolution. That Zhivago ultimately has an affair is, oddly, part of the romance. In film--unlike life--true love wins over integrity. Or perhaps film recognizes that human passion and biology aren't easily restrained by social conventions. Regardless, there's more to Doctor Zhivago than illicit love.

Zhivago: What happens to a girl like that, when a man like you is finished with her?
Komarovsky: You interested? I give her to you, Yuri Andreevich. Wedding gift.

My jaw dropped when I watched that exchange.

Despite the many beautiful scenes to capture, I decided to focus on just a few cast members. You'll have to rent the movie to see the rest.

Omar Sharif, Ralph Richardson, Geraldine Chaplin

Julie Christie. Holy smokes!

Virtually the same shot later in the film, but what a difference in expression, aided by makeup that ages her about ten years.

Geraldine Chaplin. Hell, I fell in love with her.

Here she reminds me of actress Jennifer Connelly.

Omar Sharif. This is a classic look, much the same as Lawrence Olivier and Colin Firth

The poet.

The loss.

Lovely, just lovely cinematography.

I suppose this should go in my Creative Writing site, but here it is. Billy Collins is America's Poet Laureate, and this is an example why.

The Death of the Hat
--Billy Collins

Once every man wore a hat.

In the ashen newsreels,
the avenues of cities
are broad rivers flowing with hats.

The ballparks swelled
with thousands of straw hats,
brims and bands,
rows of men smoking
and cheering in shirtsleeves.

Hats were the law.
They went without saying.
You noticed a man without a hat in a crowd.

You bought them from Adams or Dobbs
who branded your initials in gold
on the inside band.

Trolleys crisscrossed the city.
Steamships sailed in and out of the harbor.
Men with hats gathered on the docks.

There was a person to block your hat
and a hatcheck girl to mind it
while you had a drink
or ate a steak with peas and a baked potato.
In your office stood a hat rack.

The day war was declared
everyone in the street was wearing a hat.
And they were wearing hats
when a ship loaded with men sank in the icy sea.

My father wore one to work every day
and returned home
carrying the evening paper,
the winter chill radiating from his overcoat.

But today we go bareheaded
into the winter streets,
stand hatless on frozen platforms.

Today the mailboxes on the roadside
and the spruce trees behind the house
wear cold white hats of snow.

Mice scurry from the stone walls at night
in their thin fur hats
to eat the birdseed that has spilled.

And now my father, after a life of work,
wears a hat of earth
and on top of that,
a lighter one of cloud and sky--a hat of wind.

I'm about to drink eggnog, eat peach cobbler, and watch Vampire Wars: Battle for the Universe. All that's missing is a hot date.