ia_2011_d_mendez

=D. Analysis (500-650 words) Tips]=

The significance of Rasputin at the time was crucial for people to start the revolution over Russia and try to remove the Tsar from the government of their country. The film Rasputin describes a dark person and life which, in theory, provoked the fall of the Tsarism. Rasputin was a really important character, in a way or the other he had changed the way of Russia’s history; his acts and his personality made changed a whole nation against the Tsar. But it was not as easy as it seems. Russia was passing through a hard situation. The economy was in a bad moment and the outbreak of the war made peasants and the proletariat to turn against the government, and obviously against the Tsar. The way in which the Tsar acted in the entire war situation also affected people’s confidence on him and made him even weaker. People losing their confidence on the government it is not good because then they fight to find the stability for their country and their lives. Rasputin was only a mere person in who blame the whole situation. The way he acted and the antagonism created because of his actions, made people hate him and disapprove that their country was helped to being ruled by a bad-mannered and uneducated man. The film keeps all the film remarking the huge contrast between Rasputin and the royal family, one of the reasons for his rejection by the nobility. Rasputin, coming from a poor background [1], managed to be introduced into the Romanov family, and this created antagonism on the nobility because they thought he did not deserved what he was getting just from the illness of Alexei. One of the scenes of the film shows this contrast between Rasputin and the rest of the people around him: in a dinner scene begins eating with his hands whereas talking about inappropriate issues at the table [2]. This image of Rasputin as a bad-mannered man develops a very negative perspective of the character to the audience. Those entire things make the audience do not like Rasputin, making more likable the Romanov family. The revolutionaries are also another characters showed in the film. They appear as cold people, making easy for the audience to blame the whole situation on them and on Rasputin. The coldness of the revolutionaries is mainly show when they do enter into the palace [3], as well as in one of the last scenes, the murder of the Romanov family. The soldiers murdered the whole family, included Alexei who was an innocent and inoffensive kid. [4] The nobility did not like Rasputin at all, and this is perfectly showed on the film Rasputin, Uli Edel manages to show the way for what Rasputin did not like the Russians, as well as creating a good image of the Romanov family. The film tries to show the humanity of the Romanov family from the perspective of the narrator, the heir to the throne, Alexei. By narrating the story from his point of view, the director attempts to make the Romanov family more likable to the audience. Examples of those humanity moments in the Romanov’s family life are those moments in which Nicholas II and Alexandra show the love they feel for each other as well the moments in whose they concern about their son’s serious illness. [5] Alexei is described in my both sources as an important key for the fall of the Tsarism. Indirectly, he introduced Rasputin into the Romanov family causing many problems to his father and the country. “// For the peace and the tranquillity of Russia, for his population save the life of this kid” // [6], says Rasputin in the film. The importance of Alexei is essential to understand the opinion that Rasputin was the causal of the fall of the Tsardom. Alexander Kerensky said “If there had been no Rasputin, there would have no Lenin”, [7] and Robert K. Massie, a historical writer, add “if this is true, it is also true that if there had been no haemophilia, there would have been no Rasputin”. [8] The haemophilia and Alexei introduced easily Rasputin into the royalty. Gradually he was gaining more and more power and deciding about main events occurring in Russia at that time, as the film describes. // (713 words) //

[1] Uli Edel, “Rasputin”, 1996, HBO Pictures, 00:02:10 – 00:04:26 - Appendix 8 [2] Uli Edel, “Rasputin”, 1996, HBO Pictures, 00:28:43 – 00:32:30 - Appendix 8 [3] Uli Edel, “Rasputin”, 1996, HBO Pictures, 01:26:26 - 01:28:50 - Appendix 8 [4] Uli Edel, “Rasputin”, 1996, HBO Pictures, 01:02:29 – 01:04:02 - Appendix 8 [5] - Uli Edel, “Rasputin”, 1996, HBO Pictures, 01:02:29 – 01:04:02 - Appendix 8 - Uli Edel, “Rasputin”, HBO Pictures, 00:28:03 – 00:28:40 - Appendix 8 - Uli Edel, “Rasputin”, HBO Pictures, 00:57:24 – 00:58:02 - Appendix 8 [6] Uli Edel, “Rasputin”, 1996, HBO Pictures, 00:37:05 – 00:40:30 - Appendix 8 [7] [] [8] []