First Look at Keira Knightley as Anna Karenina
Posted 02.23.12 by Mandy
Once again, Keira Knightley and director Joe Wright (Atonement, Pride & Prejudice) are teaming up for a period movie based on a novel. This time around, the duo is taking on the white-hot trend of basing a movie on a late 19th-century Russian novel dealing with the fallen bourgeois contrasted with the strength and intrinsic worth of the proletariat. Those are nearly as popular as movies about vampires fighting werewolves.
Four pics of Knightley as the title character in Anna Karenina were posted on the Focus Features website (and Collider), and they further illustrate the point that the actress can really wear any look from the past 250 years with panache. The new pics also feature Jude Law as Anna's dull politician husband Alexei Karenin and Aaron Johnson as the dashing Count Alexei Vronsky. (Seriously, Tolstoy? Two main characters with the same first name? This is why 12th graders hate you.) While only a few years ago it seemed impossible that Law could ever play the stodgy, boring husband, these photos make the casting decision look pitch perfect.
The screenplay for Anna Karenina was written by Tom Stoppard (Shakespeare in Love), but there's no word yet on whether the story will concentrate on Anna's extramarital affair or Levin (Domhnall Gleeson) mowing with a scythe. The movie co-stars Matthew Macfadyen as Oblonsky, Kelly Macdonald as Dolly, Alicia Vikander as Kitty, and Emily Watson as Countess Lydia. The movie does not yet have a US release date, but it will open in the UK on September 7.