Rasputin: The Mad Monk (1966) on Netflix
NR19661h 31mBiographyDramaHorror
Cast out of his monastery for drunkenness and licentious behavior, Rasputin heads for Saint Petersburg. There he turns his healing hands and hypnotic powers on the women of the Tsar's court.
- Netflix2.9/5
- IMDb6.2/103,856 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes57%
Trailer
Plot summary
Grigori Rasputin is a peasant mystic with a gift for healing, a taste for drink and an appetite for women. In the Russian countryside he cures an innkeeper's sick wife and then seduces the man's daughter; a young man attacks him, Rasputin severs his hand with a scythe, and the locals drive him off. Hauled before a bishop for his violence and immorality, he says that he sins so that God has something worth forgiving, and he is expelled from his monastery. In Saint Petersburg he installs himself in the house of Dr Zargo, a physician struck off after a scandal, and begins his campaign to reach the Tsarina, taking her lady-in-waiting Sonia as his mistress and his way in, and working to be summoned to the palace to heal the ailing heir, Alexei.
Cast
- Robert Duncanas Tsarvitch
Show all 20 cast
- Michael Godfreyas Doctor (uncredited)
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Rasputin: The Mad Monk (1966)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- As a child in the 1920s, Christopher Lee met Felix Yusupov, the real-life killer of Rasputin; much later in life the actor also met Rasputin's daughter Maria.
SPOILER
The original ending showed the lifeless Rasputin lying on the ice with his hands held up to his forehead in benediction; it was cut for religious reasons, though stills of it survive.- Hammer replaced Prince Yusupov with the character Ivan, played by Francis Matthews, for legal reasons because Yusupov was still alive when the film was released.
- Rasputin the Mad Monk was shot back-to-back with Dracula: Prince of Darkness in 1965 on the same sets at Hammer's Bray Studios, with Christopher Lee, Francis Matthews, Barbara Shelley and Suzan Farmer appearing in both films.
- Director Don Sharp said the film's budget was cut during filming, which caused the loss of several key scenes.
- Don Sharp said the final fight between Francis Matthews and Christopher Lee was greatly cut by Tony Keys when Sharp had to leave the film during editing.
