Russians sneak a peek at BBC's War and Peace

Many Russian viewers of the series have been positive, but some have taken to social media to question its accuracy

Millions of viewers in the UK will watch the last episode of the BBC drama War and Peace on Sunday.But far removed from TV screens in the UK, another very demanding audience will be closely watching too: in Russia, and in their thousands.The film-makers may not have them in mind.

But Russian TV has shown strong interest in buying the rights, although nothing is yet confirmed.

At least one Muscovite, Kristina Kim, was not won over by the adaptation and gave up halfway through. "Pigs running in the middle of Moscow, Countess Mary's clothes and hair done like a maid, and then the Husssar's pelisse slung over the right shoulder? Don't even get me started on the battle scenes," she complained.

Ask any Russian, and they will of course tell you your pelisse goes over the left shoulder. Sling it over the right and you will impede sabre-rattling. Obviously.In her disappointment, Kristina was driven to watch the 1967 Soviet epic that won director Sergei Bondarchuk an Oscar.
"The interiors, the decor, the Moscow winter and the war scenes especially are ideal there," she told the BBC. "Of course Field Marshal Kutuzov and all the fighting were shot with such expense you wouldn't expect any flaws."No effort and no expense were spared in providing the Soviet film-makers with what they needed.

• 3,000 Soviet soldiers were drafted for one battle scene
• 57 museums donated exhibits for the shoots
• More than 40 state firms were enlisted to produce replica weapons and costumes
• It took seven years to make and cost millions of roubles, at the time an astonishing sum

This was because the Soviet film had not only cinematic, but political importance.

The authorities in Moscow were anxious that Hollywood had got there first, with the 1956 film featuring Audrey Hepburn and Henry Fonda.Such an important task could not be entrusted to young actors, so Soviet film-goers saw 20-year-old Pierre Bezukhov played by Sergei Bondarchuk himself, then 47. And Vyacheslav Tikhonov, who played Prince Andrei Bolkonsky, was nearly 40.At 25, the Soviet Natasha, actress Ludmila Savelyeva, came close to the age Leo Tolstoy imagined her to be.Now 74, she believes that it is extremely hard to get the cast 100% right in a film with so many actors."I saw the 2007 [Franco-Italian-German-Russian] TV production and the cast was mainly a mish-mash, although one male actor was very nice," she told BBC. "Their Natasha was acting really strange, running barefoot and hanging on Pierre's neck."
She is waiting eagerly for the BBC series to be shown on Russian TV.

Whatever Russians feel about the latest adaptation, it has revived their interest in the story and sent many back to Tolstoy's 1,300-page original.
Every 16-year-old in Russia is required to read the epic work under the school curriculum, and many Russians still remember having to recite Prince Andrei's three pages of thoughts under an oak tree.
"I've read up to where Andrei was wounded: should I continue watching?" asks an engrossed Dmitry Nuritov, 18, from Chelyabinsk. "I think I'll read the book first," he decides.