With a great performance from Christopher Lee as Rasputin, and a rather red-hot (and elegant) Barbara Shelley, it's hard to imagine not liking this movie. But the script is very thin on historical fact - time and place in particular are vague - and the characterization of the villain Rasputin is two-dimensional. If this story is true, then Rasputin was not merely mad, but also magical and literally demonic. Consequently, an interesting historical character becomes the stuff of fiction, and the film fails to educate the viewer. The presence of Lee and Shelley make it worth watching anyhow.
Review of Rasputin: The Mad Monk
