Resurrection

In Edwin Carewe's 1927 adaptation of the Tolstoy classic, Prince Dimitri's youthful indiscretion sets off a catastrophic chain of events for Katusha, an orphaned peasant girl. What begins as a fleeting summer romance in a rural district curdles into a lifelong sentence of suffering when Katusha is cast out, pregnant and disgraced, by the very family she served. Her descent from a hopeful girl to a hardened survivalist on the streets of St. Petersburg is a brutal indictment of class disparity. When Dimitri, now a man of high standing, finds himself seated on the jury of Katusha's murder trial, the film shifts into a psychological exploration of guilt. Though she is innocent of the poisoning charge, the machinery of the state and Dimitri's own past negligence ensure her exile to Siberia. The narrative follows their final, somber reconciliation in the frozen wastes, where Dimitri seeks a redemption that Katusha, perhaps rightfully, refuses to fully grant him.