Plot[edit]
In 1916, Tsar Nicholas II hosts a ball at the Catherine Palace to celebrate the Romanov tricentennial. His mother, the Dowager Empress Marie Feodorovna, is visiting from Paris and gives a music box and a necklace inscribed with the words “Together in Paris” as parting gifts to her youngest granddaughter, eight-year-old Grand Duchess Anastasia. The ball is suddenly interrupted by the sorcerer Grigori Rasputin, the former royal advisor of the Romanovs until he was banished by Nicholas II for treason. In retaliation, Rasputin sells his soul in exchange for an unholy reliquary, which he uses to place a curse on the Romanov family, sparking the Russian Revolution. Only Marie and Anastasia are able to escape the siege of the palace, thanks to a young servant boy named Dimitri, who shows them a secret passageway in Anastasia's room. Rasputin confronts the two royals outside, only to fall through the ice and freeze to death. The pair manage to reach a moving train, but only Marie climbs aboard while Anastasia falls, hitting her head on the platform and ending up with amnesia.
Ten years later, in 1926, Russia is under communist rule, and Marie has publicly offered 10 million rubles for the safe return of her granddaughter. Dimitri and his friend and partner Vladimir, thus search for a look-alike to bring to Paris and pass off as Anastasia so as to collect the reward from Marie. Elsewhere, Anastasia, now using the name "Anya", leaves the rural orphanage where she grew up, having lost her memory prior to arriving there. Accompanied by a stray puppy she names "Pooka", she turns down a job at a fish factory in favor of going to Saint Petersburg after her necklace inspires her to seek out her family in Paris. In the deserted palace she encounters Dimitri and Vladimir, who are impressed by her resemblance to the "real" Anastasia and decide to take her with them.
Bartok, Rasputin's albino bat minion is nearby and notices his master's dormant reliquary suddenly revived by Anastasia's presence; it drags him to limbo, where the soul of Rasputin survives. Enraged to hear that Anastasia escaped the curse, Rasputin sends demonic spirits from the reliquary to kill her; despite two assassination attempts, the trio manage to (unwittingly) foil him, forcing Rasputin and Bartok to travel back to the surface.
Anastasia, Dimitri and Vladimir eventually reach Paris and go to meet Marie, who refuses to see her, having been nearly fooled numerous times before by impostors. Despite this, Sophie—Marie's cousin—quizzes Anastasia to confirm her identity. Dimitri and Vladimir had taught Anastasia all the answers, but when Anastasia independently, though vaguely, recalls how a boy (namely Dimitri) saved her ten years ago, Dimitri realizes that she is the real "Grand Duchess", and later informs Vladimir at the Russian Ballet. Dimitri, however, insists they do not reveal this truth to Anastasia. Sophie, convinced as well, arranges for Anastasia to meet Marie after a Russian ballet. However, Marie wants nothing to do with Dimitri, having heard of him and his initial scheme to lie to her. Anastasia overhears that Dimitri was using her all along as part of his con to get Marie's money and she confronts him about it before she walks off. Dimitri manages to change Marie's mind by presenting her with Anastasia's music box, which he had found after their escape. Anastasia's memory returns upon meeting Marie, and grandmother and granddaughter are reunited at long last.
The next day, Marie offers Dimitri the reward money, but to her surprise he refuses it and leaves for Russia and thanks Anastasia for her return to her grandmother. That night, at Anastasia's return celebration, Marie informs her of Dimitri's gesture and leaves her to her thoughts. Anastasia then wanders through a garden and onto the Pont Alexandre III, where she is trapped and attacked by Rasputin. Dimitri returns to save her, but is injured and knocked unconscious. In the struggle, Anastasia manages to get hold of Rasputin's reliquary and crush it underfoot, destroying it. With Rasputin's soul having been tied to the reliquary, he promptly dies and disintegrates.
Afterwards, Dimitri and Anastasia reconcile after Anastasia finally discovers the truth about herself; they elope and Anastasia sends a farewell letter to Marie and Sophie, promising to return one day. The couple kisses on a riverboat and Bartok shares a kiss with a female bat before bidding the audience farewell.
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