Word: napoleonism
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...might almost have been better if the adaptation had departed as far from the facts of the novel as it does from its spirit. The central event--Napoleon's invasion of Russia in 1812--still remains, and so do a considerable number of the major characters. Natasha Rostov still falls in love with the noble soldier, Prince Andrey, and out again, and in again just before Andrey dies. Pierre Bezuhov still marries a worthless woman and fights a duel over her. But their actions, as well as those of some of the minor characters, often appear purely mechanical, without...
...grace. The least satisfactory of the starring trio is Mel Ferrer, who displays more stiffness than grandeur. As portrayed by Oscar Homolka, the Russian commander, General Kutuzov, has considerably more moral force, particularly in a scene where he thanks God for the delivery of his country from danger after Napoleon withdraws from Moscow...
...when he won his first grand victory, the Battle of Blenheim (1704). By that age "Wellington had won his last and Napoleon was dead," notes Author Rowse. To the warfare of his time-a static business of formal sieges, sedate marches and textbook battles-Churchill brought a degree of speed, flexibility and dash that horrified friends and foes. After Blenheim, he fought nine more campaigns, won nine more major battles...
Louis XV also dies. After him the deluge-mob shouts, bloodthirsty gutter songs, the Marseillaise. The kettledrummers in the orchestra knock themselves out producing revolutionary thunder. And then the quieter waltzes of Citizen-King Louis Philippe, a brief reprise of glory under Napoleon the Third, World War I -La Madelon, Tipperary, Over There. Three majestic, mournful booms sound from the percussion section; at each one, the lights fade, and at last the palace is plunged once more into darkness...
...some 180,000 people saw it, and by last year the entire original production cost of $125,000 was paid off.) Georges Van Parys, one of France's best-known movie composers, did the music for the simpler spectacle at Compiègne, the rural pleasure dome of Napoleon III and Empress Eugénie. Other pageants are staged at Avignon, 14th century home of the exiled Popes; at Chenonceaux, onetime home of Diane de Poitiers, mistress of Henry...