The setting of this film is set to give the audience a quick glimpse of what live is for all the characters in this film. It is set on a stage in that it opens up to a scene in the household of Oblonsky that shows a pleasant scene far from what transpires after that. The audience gets to understand and comprehend the dramatic changes that take place in the movie by trying to relate the initial scenes of bliss and the inevitable tragedies that happen. The happy moments in the initial stages blur the tragedies that occur in the aftermath of adultery, deception and the tension that characterize the whole film. Therefore, the stage setting is ideal because it brings out the true picture of the developments from the beginning to the final events and episodes in this film. Anna is probably not a likeable character. She exhibits a behavior that all the people that are close to her loath and dislike. All the people that come across her in the later stages of the film try to shun her. Everybody considers her disgraceful because of her adultery, and nobody offers sympathy because she demonstrated no remorse at all for her actions that were considered wayward in that society.
In a society that shunned adultery, betrayal and disloyalty, all that is happening to Anna can be justified. She is taking responsibility of her actions, and her scornful life comes about as a result of these efforts. Although we do not see the same treatment of wayward men in that society, we can not entirely say that she is being punished because she is a woman. Stiva’s life also falls apart because of his adulterous ways when he tries to tell Dolly that she can't leave him just because of a minute of straying (Guiraud 12), and this clearly showed that he was unfaithful too. . She travels to Moscow to mediate the disagreement between his brother and Dolly, but we do not see that kind of initiative on her own side. We can say that she is a character that does not know what she wants for herself, and that is why she moves to Italy to live in seclusion with Vronsky. Fearing for rejection by the high society in Russia, she settles on this option after coming to terms that she can’t stand Karenin for her betrayal.
After being denied a divorce by Karenin, she just goes ahead and makes love with Vronsky when they meet in a hotel room after flirting with each other the previous night in the presence of Karenin. Even after claiming that her love is with Vronsky, she still betrays her feelings for him after his horse falls and breaks its back. All this happens in the presence of Karenin, and it infuriates him up to an extent of denying her a divorce. She can also be described as a selfish woman because she just wants all the attention from whoever she is with. For instance, she accuses Vronsky of paying more attention to his mother than her despite the fact that Vronsky tries to be accommodating. After leaving for an errand, she still calls him back home by writing a telegram to him.
All that is eventually happening to her is all her fault, and that is why she is receiving all the scorn and being shunned by everybody in the society. So, all that is befalling her is justified, and this can be evident in the torment that she is undergoing that finally leads to her demise. She gets delusional and thinks that Vronsky is cheating on her that drives her to anguish and desperation. All the events that happen in this setting surround her with her disloyalty, unfaithfulness and deceit that leads to her being shunned by the high society. In this case, she comes out as the villain here because everybody has mixed reaction towards her.
Work Cited
Guiraud, Edmond. Anna Karenina: A Play in Five Acts. Rockvile: Borgo Press, 2009. Print
