If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

A lot more amusing than I thought it would be.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

It's 1745. Catherine (Catherine Zeta-Jones) is a 15 year old princess of a small German principality pushed into an arranged political marriage to Grand Duke Peter by Czarina Elizabeth. After 7 years, they still haven't consummate the marriage and Elizabeth arranges to get an heir at all costs. Catherine learns to play politics and maneuver the palace intrigue. She has a son but Peter continues to be abusive. She joins forces with Bestuzhev (Brian Blessed) to continue the war against the Prussians while Peter and Vorontzov (Ian Richardson) are pushing to end it. The Czarina wants victory but she dies. Peter is crowned Czar and ends the war. Catherine falls for military man Potemkin (Paul McGann). She seizes control with military and church support. She kills Peter and expands the empire by defeating the Ottoman Empire. She aims to end serfdom and reform society but is pushed back. When Pugachev (John Rhys-Davies) pleads for reforms, he is imprisoned. He escapes and eventually takes on the identity of the deceased Czar Peter leading a revolt. This is slightly before Catherine Zeta-Jones attains her full stardom. She shows quite a lot of charisma and some sexuality for this TV movie. However there is limited style and a less-than-dramatic script. It's a historical costume drama of highlights of a great ruler. It tries to be a romance melodrama but the audience can never buy any of her relationships. She tries her hardest but this is not great romantic material. She and Paul McGann have limited chemistry. They mostly yell or overact in a romantic melodrama. There are other great actors in this and they do some good work especially Ian Richardson. The action is limited and staged amateurishly. The main bright spot is Zeta-Jones and it's interesting to see her lead this.

Ah, the story of Catherine the Great of Russia told in all its glory & splendor... as much as A&E can capture on a modest budget anyway.Honestly, an okay but not terribly spectacular account of Catherine the Great's life & exploits. Primarily of interest for seeing a young, pre-stardom Catherine Zeta-Jones getting stripped naked and what not. One scene in particular where her night clothing is cut off and removed from her lovely body is a very pleasing visual to behold on the screen, not to mention the sight of her making love by the fire and bathing.Made around 1995, three years before Catherine Zeta-Jones found fame and fortune - an a very iconic strip scene - in The Mask of Zorro opposite Antonio Banderas.

Having read the other comments on this film (by the way, I saw the 180 minute TV version), it seems to be the general opinion that Catherine Zeta-Jones was excellent. I beg to differ. Not one moment was there in the entire movie where I felt she was the protagonist, as she was supposed to be. If the real Catherine did do things that earned her the nickname "the Great", they were kept out of this movie. Going to extreme lengths to avoid one inch of her body being seen during one of the many nude scenes (then why play them at all?), Zeta-Jones never convinces as a woman of the world, a strong character, able to stand up to her mother-in-law (played brilliantly by Jeanne Moreau), and toying with the emotions of every man around. Instead she is an ice queen. No warmth, no passion, no sincerity. On the other hand, the movie has many fine performances. Ian Richardson, Brian Blessed, John Rhys-Davies (yes, he is well-cast as a violent peasant-soldier), Tim McInnerny as Iwan, aka prisoner number one. And production is beautiful, just look at Catherine's diamonds. They sparkle whereas their wearer doesn't. Does this movie enlighten the viewer about an important era in Russian history? No, but that would be asking a bit much in so little time. But it does tell a story quite entertainingly. Alas, as with many international productions, some people are simply miscast... All in all, 3 out of 4.

The Empress Elizabeth II rules mid-eighteenth century Russia. She marries her heir, the physically impotent German prince Peter, to the German princess, Catherine (Catherine Zeta-Jones). Catherine takes a lover, bears a child, plots against her husband and deposes him after he has reigned only six months. She becomes the Empress Catherine II. Well-educated and with liberal ideas, she is an astute politician and wages war with success. Yet when rebellion confronts her with the choice between fostering freedom and suppressing rebellion, she chooses suppression.Catherine II was a fascinating and complex ruler, the period was crucial in determining the future course of Russia, its expansionary empire, its reactionary society and primitive economy. This film, however, addresses none of these great themes, except in the most cursory and superficial manner. It is a shallow drama of empty spectacle, in which intimate diversions are followed by unconvincing public events, battles and rebellions. The psychological characteristics of the protagonists, the motivations that drive them, the reasons for their decisions are all left unexplained. "There are great matters at stake", says Catherine to Potyomkin (Paul McGann), but we are never told what they are. Such rationalizations as do emerge involve the anachronistic importation of late twentieth-century western liberal concerns into eighteenth-century Russian society.Television drama need not seem cheap. This film does. There is a good cast, but the dialogue is empty and its delivery perfunctory, although Ian Richardson's Vorontsov is done well and Brian Blessed is surprisingly well-moduated (and exceptionally quiet) as Bestuzhev. Generally, the cast seems dispirited by the trite, thin, lines they are asked to utter. One hundred minutes spent watching Miss Zeta-Jones will always have its rewards. None the less, she is miscast. Most particularly, her voice is in its nature contemporary and middle class, with its very modern inability correctly to pronounce the letter 'r'; it is unsuitable to the role of an eighteenth century aristocrat and Empress. The set pieces are sparse and unconvincing and the direction humdrum.The story and this cast deserved better than this slight spectacle.