The Last Station

2010 • 112 minutes

About this movie

An all-star cast including Helen Mirren, James McAvoy, Christopher Plummer, Paul Giamatti, Anne-Marie Duff and Kerry Condon feature in this sumptuous period love story set in the last year of the life of legendary writer Leo Tolstoy. Tolstoy (Plummer), having rejected his title and embraced an ascetic lifestyle, finds himself increasingly at odds with his wife Sofya (Mirren). As his devoted disciple Vladimir Chertkov (Giamatti) urges him to sign a new will leaving the rights to his work to the Russian people rather than his family, the conflict between husband and wife grows to breaking point. The whole affair is witnessed by Tolstoy's new secretary, Valentin Bulgakov (McAvoy), whose burgeoning love for the beautiful and feisty Masha (Condon) is set against the waning love of Tolstoy and Sofya. The Last Station is a film about the difficulty of living with love and the impossibility of living without it.