https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor_Zhivago_(novel)
Boris Pasternak's book, Doctor Zhivago, is an attempt by the the poet to analyze and summarize in the form of a long novel his own life experience, and the Soviet experience in general. It's certainly a very critical work, but, it is not an entirely negative presentation of even the worst periods of the Soviet Union. It was much too negative to be published in the Soviet Union, of course, and Pasternak was forced to turn down his Nobel Prize, and was subject to a certain amount of persecution because of it. It accurately presents the Soviet system as a response to the corruption and brutality of the Tsarist regime, but also details the even greater brutality of the early Soviet regime. Zhivago suffers terribly because of all this, and dies young, because it has all worn him out completely. However, his illegitimate daugther by the young woman he loved lives on. As does his poetry, which acquires a certain renown. The implication is, that, although there is much that is negative in the Soviet Union, the jury is still out on it, and there is still hope that it may improve, and turn into something truly beautiful.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor_Zhivago_(film)
David Lean's 1965 film of Doctor Zhivago, starring Omar Sharif and Julie Christie, is a rather successful attempt by the director to turn this book into a highly accessible romantic melodrama. It is, also, remarkably apolitical. There's really no critical evaluation of the Soviet Union, at all. The Tsarist regime is presented very negatively as being brutal and corrupt, the Soviet Union is presented as being an inevitable transformation into something new, that has potential, but, is still crude and unformed. I suppose that given when the film was made, in the 1960's, this isn't terribly surprising. Leonid Brezhnev's USSR was not nearly as brutal or repressive as the Stalinist regime had been, and, although not particularly prosperous, it wasn't desperately poor either. Things seemed to be getting somewhat better, in the USSR, for a while, anyway.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lcTn8gcsK28
In 2006, the Russian Federation produced an eight hour miniseries based on Dr. Zhivago. It is significant, and of interest in a number of ways. In particular, as is usual in contemporary Russia, the Tsarist regime of Nicholas II is presented very positively indeed, there is no indication of any brutality, or corruption, at all, really. When Tsarist troops attack Russians, it is always, and only, in pure self-defense! This is historically false, of course, but, bear in mind, Vladimir Putin's Russian Orthodox Church has actually made Nicholas II a Saint and Martyr of the Russian Orthodox Church. Everyone in Tsarist Russia is presented as happy and prosperous. It is only with WWI, and then the Russian Revolution, and Russian Civil War, that everything falls apart. The fact that WWI was largely a distraction arranged by Nicholas II to prevent his regime from being toppled by strikes goes, of course, unnoted. Zhivago is presented as a good man, destroyed by the Revolution, his life rendered utterly meaningless, and empty, by communism, and he disappears, without a trace.
Among other things, this film indicates that rather bizarre view many Russians now have that Nicholas II represented the ideal ruler, and Imperial Russia the ideal Russian government. Something to be borne in mind, in dealing with the Russians!
