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One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich

Play trailer Poster for One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich G 1970 1h 40m Drama Play Trailer Watchlist
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17% Tomatometer 6 Reviews 92% Popcornmeter 50+ Ratings
Ivan Denisovich (Tom Courtenay) is a prisoner in a Siberian labor camp where he's been sentenced to 10 long years. Sick one morning, he oversleeps and is punished for it with latrine duty. When he reports his illness to the infirmary, he's told no more prisoners can be exempted from work and is sent to do construction work in the brutal cold. As the day wears on, Ivan rejoices that his illness has passed, does a favor for a scrap of food and tries to maintain what he can of his humanity.

Critics Reviews

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Variety Staff Variety 09/10/2008
Though faithful to the novel, the film emerges as strangely unmoving. Go to Full Review Geoff Andrew Time Out 01/26/2006
In his efforts to be accurate and restrained, Wrede forsakes passion, and creates a film as cold and clinical as the environment it observes. Go to Full Review Roger Greenspun New York Times 05/09/2005
Grim, tedious, and predictable. Go to Full Review Emanuel Levy EmanuelLevy.Com 09/04/2005
3/5
Tony Mastroianni Cleveland Press 11/20/2003
The trouble with making a movie about tedium and hopelessness is that it runs into the danger of being itself tedious. This one is. Go to Full Review Film4 Staff Film4 05/24/2003
Despite Courtenay's convincing turn, the sheer power of the novel is not matched in the screen adaptation and the result, while well-meaning and historically sound, just doesn't come across the way it should. Go to Full Review Read all reviews

Audience Reviews

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09/05/2015 Excellent movie. Tom Courtenay is terrific See more 11/06/2009 Searing portrayal of life in a Soviet gulag. See more Read all reviews
One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich

My Rating

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Cast & Crew

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Caspar Wrede

Director

Tom Courtenay

Ivan Denisovich

Espen Skjonberg

Tiurin

James Maxwell

Captain

Alfred Burke

Alyosha

Eric Thompson

Tsetzar

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One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich

One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich (1971) One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich (1971) View more photos

Movie Info

Synopsis Ivan Denisovich (Tom Courtenay) is a prisoner in a Siberian labor camp where he's been sentenced to 10 long years. Sick one morning, he oversleeps and is punished for it with latrine duty. When he reports his illness to the infirmary, he's told no more prisoners can be exempted from work and is sent to do construction work in the brutal cold. As the day wears on, Ivan rejoices that his illness has passed, does a favor for a scrap of food and tries to maintain what he can of his humanity.
Director
Caspar Wrede
Producer
Caspar Wrede
Screenwriter
Ronald Harwood, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Distributor
Cinerama Releasing Corporation [us]
Production Co
Norsk Film, Group W Films, Leontes
Rating
G
Genre
Drama
Original Language
English
Release Date (Theaters)
Dec 7, 1970, Original
Runtime
1h 40m
Sound Mix
Mono