Movies

What is your favourite Shakespeare film adaptation? (And films like 10 Things I Hate about you can count, too.)

My absolute favorite has to be Branagh's Much Ado about Nothing. I first saw it when I was about 11, and it really got me into Shakespeare. I still laugh hysterically every time I see Benedick fighting with that garden chair...

My runners-up would be Branagh's Hamlet (although the end with the slo-mo bugs me) and the version of Midsummer Night's Dream with Stanley Tucci as Puck. Fantastic!

Despite myself, Gibson's (I mean Zeffireli's) Hamlet.

Greenaway's Prospero's Books.

Kurosawa's Ran.

I have Branagh's Love's Labour's Lost at home now but haven't had a chance to watch it yet.

Branagh's version of Much Ado About Nothing certainly tops the list.

I like Olivier's Henry V, too. (I haven't seen his Hamlet yet.)

I'll have to give a good think on what else I've seen.

Branagh's Hamlet is excellent but perversely the full version is available on DVD only for Region 1, which has had the rest of us stewing. Supposedly it'll be out at the end of April. (Earlier it had been announced for February.)

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Not that I condone such actions, but you could torrent it if you are willing. That is how some of my friends in Europe got it.

I normally wouldn't condone it either, but if it's not available in a (legal) format you can use, it may be your only option.

If anyone whose work might be torrented is reading this, I'd like to hear their take on the idea. Some such people might not object strongly (at least their work is being seen/heard). Then again, there will almost certainly be people who think otherwise.

I'll just wait a little longer, and enjoy the pleasure of delayed gratification.

Okay, since I started this... My favourites happen to be the aforementioned 4-hour Hamlet...I like all the interludes (flashbacks) that could not normally be told on a stage.

I love the newer version of Midsummer: it is just magical to me and I like Bottom.

I may receive some jeers for this, but I absolutely love Titus. One could debate whether it is a play by the original bard. In spite of that, I find the movie to be a good mix of original surrealism and the poetic language delivered quite well.

Has anyone here seen Looking for Richard? I haven't, but I do enjoy Al Pacino's eccentricities.

I've seen parts of Looking for Richard and really enjoyed it - including Al Pacino's weirdness (which I normally don't - I just couldn't get behind his Merchant of Venice, the lisp bothered me). I think it's definitely worth watching for people into Shakespeare, but particularly for those interested in acting and the acting process.

Looking For Richard is interesting and definitely worth seeing, though it's occasionally a little sentimental in its humanistic pitch.

Excoriate me if you must, but I actually enjoyed Branagh's version of "Loves Labours Lost". (I never know where to put the postrophes, so I've ignored 'em.)

It looks wonderful, Nathan Lane is a terrific American vaudeville Costard, and I even like the songs (yes, they stuck some songs in there - great songs, mind), but fairly inexcusably they dropped most / all of the Nine Worthies.

#12

I would love to see it simply because Branagh puts so much passion into his adaptations.

I adore Trevor Nunn's version of Twelfth Night, which I could ramble on for hours about, but I'll spare you the pain. (Although it does have an adorable young Helena Bonham-Carter as Olivia!)
Zeffirelli's Romeo and Juliet is also pretty fantastic

I enjoyed Branagh's Henry V, too. Not as good as his Much Ado About Nothing, and modeled a bit on Olivier's Henry V, but it deserves a mention.

At the other end of the scale: Romeo + Juliet with Leonardo DiCaprio. Borderline unwatchable.

I've only just discovered LT's 'Group suggestions' feature and, hence, only just discovered this group, of which I was previously completely unaware - and I'm quite delighted to have found it. I hope nobody minds if I copy across a post I made in another thread a few weeks back:

I've recently discovered a rather delightful DVD of a 1976 'The Taming of the Shrew' with Marc 'Beastmaster' Singer and Fredi Olster (of whom I'd never previously heard and on this showing I can't imagine why) as Petruchio and Kate.

It's a recording of a stage performance and it's done in the style of some old Commedia dell'arte troupe playing on temporary stages in town squares, with the offstage players standing or sitting round the edges watching the action. It's very physical and 'over-the-top' and great fun.

I found a pretty good YouTube clip - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RdqOHvcD-VU - for anyone who doesn't know it.

The odd thing is that I'd never previously taken much interest in 'Shrew' but, having purchased the Oxford Shakespeare edition to go with this DVD (for the introduction and notes), I've become quite fascinated with the play itself as well as having this DVD become a firm favourite, and yet I find quite a yawning gap between what I see on the page and what's on the screen - two quite different animals, as it were.

In fact, combining the info in the book and my own - admittedly somewhat limited - knowledge of the period, I now have an idea of 'Shrew' that's quite different from any production I've ever seen.

Um ... I've just realised I've said that all those directors have got it wrong and I'm the only one getting it right. I think I'd better stop now.

I like Ian McKellen's Richard III. Taking the out of its historic setting mitigates for me the fact that it's a pack of lies.

>17 lilithcat: An excellent movie - loved McKellen's opening "Now is the winter..." delivered looking over his shoulder while standing at a urinal in the old St Pancras station hotel. Not too sure about "Bosworth" being transported to Battersea power station for the final shoot-out.