# The Idiot (2003)

> A Christ-like prince wanders corrupt 1860s St Petersburg, entangled with two women whose lives are shaped by self-destruction and desire.

Canonical page: https://ember.film/tv/59877

## Facts

- Seasons: 1
- Episodes: 10
- Episode runtime: 50 min
- Status: Ended
- Genres: drama, history
- Created by: Vladimir Bortko
- Network: Russia-1
- Cast: Evgeny Mironov, Lydia Velezheva, Olga Budina, Evgeniy Semyonov, Vladimir Ilin, Inna Churikova, Oleg Basilashvili, Anastasiya Melnikova
- TMDB rating: 8.3/10
- IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0366028/

## Ember's analysis

- Pacing: measured
- Intensity: moderate
- Complexity: layered
- Violence: mild
- Tone: melancholic, intense, morally earnest, bittersweet

## Synopsis

The Idiot (2003) is a Russian costume drama miniseries written by Vladimir Bortko and broadcast on Russia-1, adapted from Fyodor Dostoevsky's 1869 novel. Evgeny Mironov plays Prince Lev Nikolayevich Myshkin, a gentle, Christ-like nobleman who returns to a corrupt society in nineteenth century St Petersburg. His kindness draws him into a tangled emotional web with the self-destructive Nastasya Filippovna, played by Lydia Velezheva, and the romantic Aglaya Epanchina, played by Olga Budina. Around them circulate Ippolit Terentyev (Evgeniy Semyonov), General Ivan Epanchin (Oleg Basilashvili) and Lizaveta Prokofyevna (Inna Churikova), whose social ambitions and private wounds press on every decision. The engine of the story is a fragile hope that goodness can survive among money, pride and vanity, and each episode of this ten-episode run moves through drawing rooms, salons and private confrontations where desire and pity collide. Its shape is one continuous, serialized adaptation rather than a case-of-the-week format. Fans of Anna Karenina, War and Peace and Crime and Punishment will find resonance in its melancholic, morally earnest register, its lush period detail and its quiet dread of human self-destruction.

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