Fyodor Dostoevsky

Two neighbours in the housing blocks of Belgrade spark a friendship then a war as emotions and money take center stage. Based in part on the novel 'Poor Folk' by Fyodor Dostoyevsky.

Frank Castorf has adapted Racine and combined this material with texts by Artaud. His art of theatrical and vital immoderation explores how, when it comes to this classical French author, the tragedy of existence is born from collusions between private passions and power.

Stage director Frank Castorf “might have been born to direct From the House of the Dead” (Opera Today). His gritty, visually striking adaptation brings bold modern and postmodern touches to Janáček’s masterwork without ever overshadowing the intense forward momentum of the music, conducted to dramatic perfection by Simone Young and sung by an all-star cast in Munich. Janáček adapted Dostoevsky for this powerfully compelling opera set in a Siberian prison camp, full of starkly contrasting moods and motifs, unusual in its episodic structure. The last opera Janáček ever composed, its third act was on his desk when he died in 1928; attempts by his students to “complete” his orchestration have largely fallen away over the decades in favor of the original version. Despite the grimness of the setting and the brutality of several characters, the composer’s compassion shines through in tender moments, movingly illustrating his motto for the work: “in every creature, a spark of God.”

Condensing the life stories – memories of prison in Silesia – related by Dostoyevsky in his work The House of the Dead, Leoš Janáček composed an opera filled with burning desire and longing. Contagious savagery, cruelty and brutality are exacerbated by the confines of the prison. However, within its concrete walls emerge both tenderness and cruelty at the sight of an injured bird; a multitude of stories and highly personal monologues. With this production, first performed at the Wiener Festwochen in 2007, the Paris Opera pays tribute to Patrice Chéreau.

A woman lives in a small village in Russia. One day she receives the parcel she sent to her husband, serving a sentence in prison. Confused and angered, she sets out to find why her package was returned to sender.

6.6/10
7.6%

Velutha Rathrikal (White Nights) is an independent cinematic adaptation of the eponymous novel by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. Manu is an artist in search of a new sky, from his troubled past, in a forest settlement. He meets Chelly, a tribal girl from a nearby settlement who bears the burnt from her own share of life. As she awaits the return of her beloved friend Jyothi, Manu gets closer to her. Despite their diverse upbringings, Manu and Chelly strike a serene and beautiful chord with each other. Their brief but intense encounter during the five nights makes the plot of the film set against the deep woods of Attappadi and surroundings.

Anton has bad tools. When he is kicked out of his home for the day, he wanders the streets and runs into a friend of his ex, whom he proceeds to befriend.

The Brothers Karamazov novel is the epitome of Fyodor Dostoevsky’s creative work, the acme of the philosophic investigation carried out by this colossal and restless mind throughout his life. World renowned choreographer Boris Eifman offers a remarkable vision of the core ideas within the novel, expanding upon them though body language as a way of exploring the origins of the moral devastation of the Karamazovs; creating through choreographic art an equivalent of what Dostoyevsky investigated so masterfully in his book, the excruciating burden of destructive passions and evil heredity. This ballet production is also known and performed as Beyond Sin.

A washed up Hollywood director is trapped in a remote castle by his own fears until the arrival of a mysterious woman offers him possible salvation. Inspired by Dostoevsky's 'Notes from the Underground', Johnny Walker attempts to answer the burning question: Is living a long life vulgar, immoral or just plain bad manners?

6.9/10

They don't really know each other. She lives in penury. He holds a pawnshop. Poverty makes her marry him, despite she doesn't love him and even despises. After the marriage takes place, the family war begins. Based on a novel 'A Gentle Creature' by Fyodor Dostoevsky.

5.3/10

A naive man-boy falls in love with a hotheaded blind girl and tries to help win back her heroic lover, Steve.

6.8/10

An awkward office drone becomes increasingly unhinged after a charismatic and confident look-alike takes a job at his workplace and seduces the woman he desires.

6.5/10
8.3%

Set in present day Japan in a provincial town, Bunzo Kurosawa, a greedy and violent father, is murdered in his own home. Bunzo has 3 sons: oldest son Mitsuru, second son Isao and youngest son Ryo. The three sons are suspected of murdering their own father.

7.7/10

A roughly faithful adaptation of Dostoyevsky's "Crime and Punishment," set in Almaty by Kazakh filmmaker Darezhan Omirbayev A stark, Bressonian tale of a young man who commits an almost random act of murder.

5.5/10

A man's life, thoughts, feelings and his very own darkness... Adapted from Dostoevsky's novel "Notes from Undergroud", Demirkubuz follows Muharrem as he gets himself invited to a party where he is not welcome, just to find himself disgusted.

3.9/10

A man wanders the street and meets a girl. They share four nights together and talk about life and love.

A contemporary retelling of Dostoevsky's 'Notes from the Underground', unfolding in Los Angeles.

7.8/10

A story of a naive man, whose direct behavior stirs in people moral unrest, rage and embarrassment over their own pettiness, making them yearn for goodness. Based on the book by F. Dostojevski.

6.5/10

It's the tragedy of a young man whose dream of universal happiness is so powerful an influence on him that he cannot allow himself to accept the personal happiness of marriage to a young, beautiful and devoted girl. Therefore, he goes insane.

6/10

Conducted by Daniel Barenboim, the Staatskapelle Berlin performs THE GAMBLER, Prokofiev's moody, roiling opera based on a story by Fyodor Dostoyevsky.

Dostoevsky’s latter-day opus about the siblings and their father is among the masterpieces of world literature. It asks profound questions about ethics and religion. Is there a God? Does the devil exist? Is everything allowed because we live in a world without morality? And if so, does patricide even constitute a crime? One of the most interesting adaptations of the material is The Karamazovs by Czech director Petr Zelenka. We witness a group of thesps from Prague on a trip to Krakow in Poland to stage the novel as a play in a derelict steelworks as part of the Closer to Life Festival. The project, however, is born under the bad sign, apparently doomed from the start. When they arrive, the roof is about to cave in, so that the actors are told to wear safety helmets. Their sole consistent audience is a laborer (Andrzej Mastalerz) who rather follows each dress rehearsal than watching over his seven-year-old son who has suffered a tragic accident in the factory.

7.6/10

Read this in High School. One of the few reads that really hit me and never left. I thought "I want to tell this story...but HOW ?....then I realized...the ONLY way I'm going to make it is with dolls and drawings" and I just decided I'd rather make it that way rather than not at all !! (CB)

Two souls arrive in a small town, one on vacation, the other to meet a lover. They spend the most magical dream-like days of their lives in that town... with each other.

5.3/10
3.8%

Set in a Siberian prison camp, Janacek's final opera centers on the experiences of recent arrival Alexandre Petrovitch Goriantchikov (Olaf Bar), a nobleman who finds relief from the harsh conditions in the friendship of the illiterate Alyeya (Eric Stoklossa). Recorded at the Grand Theatre de Provence, this stage production is directed by the well-respected Patrice Chereau and features famed conductor Pierre Boulez. Filmed at the Aix-en-Provence Festival on 20 July 2007.

8.7/10

Unites grotesque elements, tempo, quiet dream sequences, the thrill of a detective story, but above all, he manages to capture the temperature of an actor ensemble that throws itself into the world of Dostoyevsky with immense pleasure and passion.

"Shades of Day" is a suspenseful Hollywood fable based on Fyodor Dostoyevsky's classic novella "White Nights"(considered one of the greatest love stories ever written), but here transferred to modern day Los Angeles. It's the first part of our "Dostoevsky-L.A" project, which also will include "Crime and Punishment, LA" and "Idiot, L.A". The film crosses and re-crosses the thin line that separates tragedy from comedy. It introduces us to the enchanting Linda, whose life is centered around a planned reunion with her former lover Paul. Her plans change in remarkable ways as she encounters an extraordinary cast of characters, including a new lover and a movie producer who is pursued by the Mafia.

They were four friends in heart and soul. Blood Brothers that were that were bound together by their army experience. They were good people and decent citizens. They had love, careers, hopes, a future - but they wanted more. And they wanted to commit the perfect crime...

5.8/10

Filmerzählung nach Motiven des Romans "Der Spieler" von Fjodor Dostojewski, mit Hannelore Elsner in der Titelrolle.

6.3/10

Four nights in Dostoevksy's 1847 St. Petersburg are transposed to 21st-century Los Angeles. Over that period, a self-described dreamer helps a young woman in emotional distress.

Psychological thriller larded with manga-like animations about the young, poor comic strip illustrator Nina, living with her mean landlady. She sinks further and further into a violent fantasy world.

6.6/10
1.7%

The Idiot is a costume drama TV series produced by Russia TV Channel in 2003, based on Fyodor Dostoevsky's novel of the same title. The series' script is very close to Dostoevsky's original text, and the series features well-known Russian actors.

8.4/10

A modern day adaptation of Dostoyevsky's classic novel about a young student who is forever haunted by the murder he has committed.

5.8/10

Set in the Spain of 1680, a time of torture and interrogation by the Grand Inquisitor. A young man appears that is healing the sick and raising the dead. There are rumours that he might be the second coming of the Messiah. He is brought before the Grand Inquisitor. Though questioned and tortured, he chooses to remain silent.

8.2/10

John Simm stars in this adaptation of Dostoyevsky's tragic masterpiece - a profound drama of redemption and a thrilling detective story of the soul.

5.8/10

The plot is set in modern Moscow, in the 1990s, with "New Russians", Hummer H1 SUVs, bribery, violence, truck fulls of tinned stew as a dowry, etc.

7.2/10

In the last house just behind the western borders of Russia, between Paris/Texas and Korleput/Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Cindy Sherman, Dogma 95 and Duma 2000, Frank Castorf directs his virst video production "Dämonen" ("Demons") as a sort of post-Soviet-panslavistic panopticon in his own dramaturgy based on Dostojewski's "Demons" and Camus' "The Posessed". All that in set designer Bert Neumann's industrial-designed bungalow (with swimming pool) built onto forbidding landscape.

5.6/10

Based on the story by Fyodor Dostoevsky.

"It is the story of love and of how love can be destroyed by obsession. In our lives we are subject to two contradictory drives - the drive to be good and bad, the propensity to love and to hate" -Piotr Dumala, director

7.1/10
2.1%

Frantisek, the main character is returning to his family. Until now he's been, "successfully" avoiding all relationships. He is an ingenuous and a pure person and thus, is regarded as an idiot. He becomes involved in various love and family conflicts. It is because he hasn't experienced much of the "real" life that he is able to perceive human relationships in their genuineness.

7.2/10

The first film of New York-based French director Raphael Nadjari is an adaptation of Dostoyevsky's The Gentle Creature, which had also inspired Une Femme douce of Robert Bresson. The Shade is a drama about a mysterious woman and a pawnbroker who meet in New York. The film begins with Simon, who is alone in his apartment with the corpse of his wife, Anna, who has just committed suicide. In his grief, he remembers the first time he met her, a year ago when she walked into his pawnbroker's shop in Spanish Harlem. Mysterious Anna, who seems to come from nowhere, impresses solitary Simon with her sad beauty, and he proposes to her on their first night out. The Shade is a love story with great psychological insight.

7.1/10

This is the story of Rodya Raskalnikov (Patrick Dempsey), an intellectual who is suspended from University and is living in poverty in 19th century Russia. Raskalnikov believes that in order for great men like Napoleon to accomplish great things, they must be above the law.

6/10

Under pressure from his publisher, Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoyevsky gets work on his latest piece, 'Rouletenberg'. In the 27 days it takes for him to complete the novel reality and fiction become blurred; in this feverish atmosphere of excess Dostoyevsky's characters come to life as he struggles to complete his work.

6.3/10
1.4%

Passion, criminal instincts and traditions melt together in this film that shakes our understanding of crime.

6.9/10

Laid-back private eye Jim Rockford and his brown Pontiac Firebird become embroiled in another case when he runs across an old flame, blind book editor Megan. Her no-good playboy cousin Patrick is involved with the Russian Mob, which puts everyone's life in danger. The weary Rockford must also deal with his old friend Angel, who is painting Jim's trailer to work off a debt.

7.1/10

Adapted from Dostoevsky's novella, Henry Czerny plays the narrator, Underground Man. Filled with self-hatred, he keeps a video diary where he discusses his own shortcomings and what he thinks is wrong in contemporary society. His bitterness spills over at a dinner party attended by his old college friends, an occasion which sends him running to a nearby brothel, where he meets Liza (Lee), a young prostitute.

6.4/10

An anonymous man wanders through decomposing, fog-enshrouded catacombs and encounters a series of “the degraded and the humiliated,” including a holy prostitute and a Kafkaesque bureaucrat.

6.9/10

Lima, 1980s. Based upon Fyodor Dostoyevsky's Crime and Punishment.

7/10

Andrzej Wajda's Japanese-language film based on the last chapter of Dostoevsky's Idiot, in which Prince Myshkin and Rogozhin return to the past in a conversation over the dead body of Nastassya Filippovna. Bando Tamasaburo, regarded as one of the most outstanding female impersonators in Japanese theater, plays the dual role of Myshkin and Nastassya.

6.9/10

Dostoevsky-inspired drama set in 1900s Prague about a bored arrogant playboy who spends time seducing other men's wives and dueling. He begins an affair with his friend's wife, but falls in love with her.

5.9/10

An impoverished Russian aristocrat spends his days in a fashionable German town waiting for news from Russia about the death of his rich grandmother, so that he can repay his debts to a troubled French adventurer and marry his troubled cousin. His stepdaughter Polina also expects the inheritance.

During the Yugoslav break-up, Federal Army officer is fed up with war and takes some leave in Belgrade. However, it turns out that he is less haunted by war horrors than with some sentimental skeletons in the closet. He meets his former comrade and best friend who is AWOL, but can't report him because he had an affair with his wife.

6.3/10

An animated short film based on the 1877 short story written by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. It chronicles the experiences of a man who decides that there is nothing to live for in the world, and is therefore determined to commit suicide. A chance encounter with a young girl changes his mind.

7.9/10

In a mental institution the patients see themselves as people like Jesus, Lázaro, Marta, Maria, Adão, Eve, Sonia, Raskolnikov, Aliosha e Ivan Karamasov, a Philosopher, a Profet, Santa Teresa d'Avila, reciting the Divine Comedy.

7/10

Based on the Fyodor Dostoevsky novel about a young woman who leaves her family to live with her lover whose father dead set on keeping them apart.

6.5/10

Based on Fyodor Dostoyevsky's "The Meek One", Nazar is the saga of a Bombay-based antique dealer-cum-money lender (Shekhar Kapur), who at the age of 40, marries a woman (Shambhavi Kaul) who is 17, and brings her home to his spacious flat in a multi-storied building with a magnificent view. Their marriage is not a happy one, even though he hopes it will get better. But the bride, who had until her wedding lived her life in an orphanage, is immersed in her own thoughts, and at one point even holds a revolver against her husband's head while he slept. The film explores their complex life in a manner unusual for Indian cinema.

6.2/10

A story based on a few chapters from the classical "The Brothers Karamazov" novel by Fyodor Dostoevsky.

8.2/10

Suzy, a beautiful woman, is coming back to Paris to attend the funeral of her lover, a married man. Cecile, his wife, is holding Suzy responsible for his suicide. By finding Suzy in Paris, Cecile is trying to seek the truth by playing a psychological game on her.

6.1/10

Dream (1988) is a somnambulist short about dreams taking over reality and rendering protagonists inactive.

6.3/10

French-polish movie adaptation of the novel by Dostoievski (also known as Demons), directed by Andrzej Wajda.

6.2/10

An impressionistic retelling of Dostoyevsky's "A Gentle Spirit"

7.4/10

After a successful bank robbery, Micky hopes to take back his girlfriend Mary who has been taken from him. On the way to Paris he meets Leon, a neurotic dreamer whom he considers an idiot. Leon can hardly understand what Micky is up to but he follows him everywhere and soon falls in love with Mary.

6.3/10

Немолодой чиновник уже давно подозревает жену в неверности. Его наихудшие предчувствия оправдываются в юбилей их свадьбы, когда он, чтобы поздравить жену, с букетом цветов является домой раньше обычного. Супруги не оказывается дома, постель разобрана, вещи разбросаны, а на туалетном столике лежит скандальный роман Поля де Кока "Муж без жены". В смятении, в расстроенных чувствах, чиновник бросается искать супругу по всему Петербургу...

7.1/10

A drama based on a classic novel by Fyodor Dostoevsky.

8.3/10

An adaptation of Dostoyevsky's novel, updated to present-day Helsinki. Slaughterhouse worker Rahikainen murders a man, and is forced to live with the consequences of his actions...

7.1/10

Argnetina's submission for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1981

7.2/10

A comedy divided in four episodes, set in different time periods, each starring a different couple, yet all facing the same issue: marital jealousy.

5.7/10

A dedicated clarinetist receives a valuable violin and has a difficult time deciding what to do with it.

6.3/10

Crime and Punishment, by Fyodor Dostoevsky.

This lavish Soviet/Czech co-production is based on Fyodor Dostoyevsky's famous novel, The Gambler, which tells the story of a Russian living in Germany, in a gambling resort. This film is set at the turn of the century, and was filmed in Karlovy Vary (Carlsbad), Czechoslovakia. Played by Nikolai Burlyayev, the gambler succumbs completely to his addiction, using up every resource he has (human, spiritual and financial) in his wagering, finally becoming a rootless drifter.

7.1/10

Jacques, a young man with artistic aspirations, spends four nights wandering Paris with a young woman, whom he rescued from suicide.

7.4/10
8.9%

Raskolnikov, an impoverished ex-law student, kills an old pawnbroker and her sister, perhaps for money, perhaps to prove a theory about being above the law. He comes to police attention through normal procedures (he was the victim's client), but his outbursts make him the prime suspect of the clever Porfiry. Meanwhile, life swirls around Raskolnikov: his mother and sister come to the city followed by two older men seeking his sister's hand; he meets a drunken clerk who is then killed in a traffic accident, and he falls in love with the man's daughter, Sonia, a young prostitute. She urges him to confess, promising to follow him to Siberia. Will he accept responsibility?

7.9/10

Bengali adaptation of Dostoevsky's The Idiot.

Based on the novel of the same name by Fyodor Dostoevsky. The tragic story of the Karamazov family takes place in a Russian province in the late 19th century. The relations of their father and three brothers are very complicated and contradictory. One of the brothers is accused of killing his father, whom he did not commit. The brothers are unable to help him, and only a loving girl follows him to hard labour.

7.7/10

Italian adaptation of Dostoevskys famous novel.

8.1/10

A woman has several lovers, her husband discovers her with one of them, and both men are mistaken for robbers.

4.8/10

When his young wife commits suicide with no explanation, an introspective pawnbroker looks back on their life together.

7.5/10
9.2%

Krotká is a 1967 Slovak black-and-white produced by TV a psychological drama directed by Stanislav Barabas on based a short story A Gentle Creature by Fyodor Dostoyevsky.

7.3/10

Based on a satirical short story by Fyodor Dostoyevsky concerning the escapades of a Russian civil servant.

7.1/10
9.7%

An ex-soldier named Slobodan Antic, referred to by a friend as one of the last idealists, finds himself losing control over his own life when a man identical to him starts following him around, claiming to be a friend but behaving suspiciously. Before long his dealings with this doppelganger begin to cost him and his professional and romantic life grow more and more confused.

7.4/10

Based on Dostoevsky's short story, 'A Gentle Being.'

6.8/10

Based on the short story of the same name by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. Petersburg 40s of the XIX century. Summer, white nights. On the banks of the Neva, the Dreamer meets Nastenka. Five nights, walking around the city, young people talk about themselves. Having lost faith in the feelings of the person whom she loves, Nastenka promises the Dreamer in love with her to marry him, but... the other appears, Nastenka is happy again, and the Dreamer is alone again.

6.7/10

Handsome, twenty-year-old George Hamilton had his first starring role in this so-so drama by Denis Sanders inspired by Feodor Dostoyevsky's novel Crime and Punishment.

6/10

The film is based on the first part of the novel of the same name by Fyodor Dostoevsky. Prince Myshkin returns to Russia from Switzerland, where he was treated in a psychiatric clinic. On the train, on the way to St.Petersburg, the prince meets Parfyon Rogozhin, who tells him of his passionate love for Nastasya Filippovna, the former containment woman of the millionaire Totsky. In St.Petersburg, the prince finds himself in the house of his distant relative – Lizaveta Yepanchina (General's wife), meets her husband, their daughters, as well as the Secretary of General – Ganya Ivolgin. The portrait of Nastasya Filippovna, accidentally seen on the general’s table, makes a great impression on the prince...

7.6/10

Ryevsk, Russia, 1870. Tensions abound in the Karamazov family. Fyodor is a wealthy libertine who holds his purse strings tightly. His four grown sons include Dmitri, the eldest, an elegant officer, always broke and at odds with his father, betrothed to Katya, herself lovely and rich. The other brothers include a sterile aesthete, a factotum who is a bastard, and a monk. Family tensions erupt when Dmitri falls in love with one of his father's mistresses, the coquette Grushenka. Two brothers see Dmitri's jealousy of their father as an opportunity to inherit sooner. Acts of violence lead to the story's conclusion: trials of honor, conscience, forgiveness, and redemption.

6.7/10
3%

A lonely city transplant, and a sheltered girl haunted by a lover’s promise, meet by chance on a canal bridge and begin a tentative romance that quickly entangles them in a web of longing and self-delusion.

7.8/10
8.8%

This is a special series of lost classic programs from the Golden Age of TV. The series has been restored by SabuCat Productions from the best archival film elements available in high definition, some of the programs have not been seen since they were originally broadcast. Volume One features 2 one-hour dramatic programs that feature John Cassavetes. Climax! ran for four years - This was an anthology series that presented a different story and different set of characters on each episode. It ran from 1954 to 1958 and featured Casino Royale of James Bond fame that lead to a feature film of the same titles. On August 9th, 1956 - they showed No Right to Kill directed by Buzz Kulik and starring John Cassavetes, Robert H. Harris, Joe Mantell and Terry Moore.

Kameda, who has been in an asylum on Okinawa, travels to Hokkaido. There he becomes involved with two women, Taeko and Ayako. Taeko comes to love Kameda, but is loved in turn by Akama. When Akama realizes that he will never have Taeko, his thoughts turn to murder, and great tragedy ensues.

7.3/10
7%

Adaptation of Dostoyevsky's novel about a student who plans a conceptual murder and then butts heads with a police detective.

7/10

A young man succumbs to gambling fever.

6.6/10

Muichkine, a young Russian prince, returns home to St. Petersburg from a mental institution, determined to spread decency and kindness in the harsh and cruel world. He becomes betrothed to an innocent young girl while trying to save a less-innocent woman from her own travail, but jealousy and his own naivete conjoin to bring about unimaginable tragedy.

6.9/10

B-movie film noir take on Crime and Punishment. A college student gets deeper and deeper in trouble when he takes a loan from a shady college professor.

5.7/10

An adaptation of Fyodor Dostoyevsky's "Le Eternel Mari", a somber story of marital infidelity, revenge and near madness, and starring Raimu in his last film appearance.

6.5/10

A Swedish version of Crime and Punishment. Raskolnikov, a poor student, is planning to assassinate a hated pawnbroker.

5.9/10

Pierre Chenal's adaptation of Dostoyevsky's novel, starring Pierre Blanchar and Harry Baur. Bears the influence of German Expressionism and serves as an early forerunner of poetic realism.

7/10

A man is haunted by a murder he's committed.

7/10

A loose Communist adaptation of a Dostoyevsky novel.

5.7/10

Soviet film based on Dostoevsky's autobiographical novel of his prison experiences in Tsarist days.

6.3/10

A Fyodor Otsep adaptation of Fyodor Dostoevsky's novel.

5.8/10

Suspicion surrounds a lieutenant for killing his father; based on Dostoevsky's novel.

7.3/10

Crime and Punishment, by Fyodor Dostoevsky

Student Raskolnikow, who has written an article about laws and crime, proposing the thesis, that un-ordinary people can commit crimes if their actions are necessary for the benifit of mankind, murders an old woman, who operates a crooked loaning house, as well as her sister, who made the mistake of visiting her at the wrong time. He is suspected of the crime, but somebody else confesses to the murder.

6.8/10

The Brothers Karamazov, by Fyodor Dostoevsky.

The Idiot, by Fyodor Dostoevsky.

The Idiot, by Fyodor Dostoevsky.

The Double, by Fyodor Dostoevsky.

6.2/10

Crime and Punishment, by Fyodor Dostoevsky.

An adaptation of the Dostoyevsky novel.

8.2/10

The Idiot, by Fyodor Dostoevsky.

6.8/10
7.1%