Last night I watched several more sections of Voditel dlya Very, but had to stop at this point in part 9 where Viktor sees the General’s key to his personal safe. It’s too painful to go on, because it looks like Viktor is about to do something that is not going to be able to be undone, and which is going to hurt many people at many levels. I am going to watch the rest of it, but first I have to work up enough nerve for it, which means it could be another day or even another week.
It was a lot easier to watch this 1971 version of Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island. Easy, but not particularly interesting, except for a few shipboard scenes. It’s a textbook example of the problem of filmmakers trying to be faithful to the book from which a film is made. (The Lord of the Rings is another example that comes to mind.)
I don’t see how this film could make much sense to a person hadn’t read the book. It’s too disjointed, the acting is poor, and the characters aren’t developed. It’s merely a video illustration of some of the scenes in the book. And it’s probably not as good a set of illustrations as those made by the artist N.C. Wyeth. They have the disadvantage that unlike Wyeth’s illustrations, they’re not printed in the book. If you remember how the story goes (I have a vague memory of it from years ago) you might find it interesting to see how well these illustrations fit. But you’ll probably get better video pictures in your imagination if you spend your time re-reading the book instead.