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So much average

Good story, Not enough for a whole film

I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

Wow - a chance to see the three Barrymores together.Kind of underwhelming."Rasputin and the Empress" is the amazingly inaccurate story of Rasputin and his influence on the royal family. Lionel is the man himself, John is the man who wants him dead, Prince Chegodieff, and Ethel is the Empress.This film cost MGM a lot of money in lawsuits even though the names were changed to protect the guilty. The Yusupov family made quite a bit of money thanks to their portrayal in this film, as Prince Chegodieff and Natasha.The movie doesn't hold up for reasons beyond its plot. Ethel, who was very good as a character actress in films, here does the sort of acting popular in the day, melodramatic and with a quivering voice. She just may not have been used to film acting, I don't know.Lionel played Rasputin and he was good, except that his Rasputin is apparently a rapist as well as a madman. And John, my favorite, is wasted. He really should have played Rasputin, and this film would have gone up a level or two.At any rate, seeing the three Barrymores together was a big bust. Also, John and Lionel didn't get along at least at that point, and while on the set, Lionel called the director from a pay phone and told him to tell John to stop touching him. John would put his hand on Lionel's arm in a scene, which was a way of drawing the focus to John.One big happy family. Skip it.

What works: the basic story-- about a trusted adviser who is really a menace to the family; the concept of inviting evil into one's home, thinking it is goodness, is a strong one. Also, it is evident MGM poured gobs of money into this film. Cedric Gibbons and his art department have outdone themselves with the production. And the acting is all first-rate.What doesn't work: the story is too drawn out. Too many scenes of the monk (Lionel Barrymore) hypnotizing everyone and everything in sight. Some of it is quite predictable. We knew that the prince (John Barrymore) wouldn't succeed at shooting him in the beginning, because it was too early in the story. And we needed the big fight scene near the end. Plus it was quite unrealistic that the monk doesn't even get a scratch on him when the prince fires a bullet or two into him. I suppose we can question if the monk is supernatural and not of this world, but there could have been a bit more explanation about his apparent invincibility. I almost half-expected Greta Garbo to show up in this somewhere. I was disappointed she did not.

The first family of theatre the Barrymores get together in this historically inaccurate depiction of the Romanovs in free fall and the man that help facilitate the end of an empire, Rasputin. It is the only time the three siblings appear in a film together and all three performances appear to be wanting.The son and heir to Czar Nicholas of Russia is afflicted with a disease (hemophilia) that confounds the royal physicians. Desperate to heal her son she entrusts his care to the enigmatic Rasputin who through hypnosis and terror becomes the boys trusted enabler. With his new found influence Rasputin wastes little time in consolidating his power deceiving the czarina and corrupting officials. The marquee value of John, Lionel and Ethel Barrymore may well put people inside the theater but unfortunately it is their performances that will move them just as fast to the exit. All three are dreadfully miscast and stilted as they reach for larger than life amid the splendor that was the Peacock Dynasty. John is more or less wasted as the Count trying to bring down Rasputin when he should be playing him. A year earlier he gave a tour de force as Svengali and clearly would have brought the charismatic verve that Rasputin needs instead of the cantankerous Lionel who though chilling is more crotchety than messianic. Ethel coated in layers of jewelery and gowns does little more than fret and add tremulous vocals. Outside the family in the crucial role of Czar Nicholas, Ralph Morgan hardly registers. True, Nicholas was an ineffectual leader but Morgan plays him to near invisibility. Cinematographer William Daniels and set director Cedric Gibbons and crew give the film a regal look of pomp and ceremony but the family Barrymore en masse remains lost if luckier than the Romanovs. At least they didn't get shot for their poor performances.

Watch 1971's "Nicholas and Alexandra", watch the cable TV movie with Alan Rickman as Rasputin, watch the silent film about the last Czar--Don't watch this clunker. Far and away the worse film on the fall of the Romanov Royal dynasty that I've ever seen. Bad acting--Poor choices for Alexis and Alexandra. The portrayal of Rasputin -- yeah, right--- if he had reached 70 and his voice was....Who could relax listening to a sinister warlock stirring a pot????? That's what he sounded like to me. I've seen drunk, lecherous Rasputins, I've seen charlatan Rasputins but never one that "mad scientists" creep-ed me out. Nicholas, the most watchable actor of all in this atrocity, is hardly seen on screen.Gross, gross re-write of history on several key points and by the film's end I wanted to burn all the copies of this film because of "Prince Paul" and his gal pal....OH, the horror, the horror.The death scenes both of Rasputin and Nicholas and his family is beyond bad.