Just after a crucial event in ANNA KARENINA (Joe Wright, 2012), Anna’s stuffy bureaucrat husband Karenin (Jude Law) reflects on the debate about horse racing. It’s dangerous, he says, but it might be worth it for the spectacle. It’s hard not to see in his words a thesis statement for this latest film version of Tolstoy’s adulterous tale. The first half-hour especially has much in common with a horse race, hurtling forward at a break-neck pace, defying inertia and gravity alike, but seemingly always on the verge of a perilous fall. It’s exhilarating but you know it could stumble at any time. Lees verder →