Grand Theft Hamlet (2024) opens Friday

I want to say this just to get it out of the way, while I really liked this film and it's surreal nature, I hope to hell I never have to see another film like this ever again. I say that because quite honestly this film shouldn't work and while it does, I hate to think of all the copycats that this may spawn.

This is a documentary about a bunch of gamers who decide to perform Hamlet in the world of the video game Grand Theft Auto. This means that as the actors are performing weird things are going on around them and some times people show up just to shoot them dead.

Yes, it is as WTF as that sounds. Yes it is screamingly funny at times. Yes some of this doesn't work....

...and yet you can't look away. I went from "you must be joking" and wanting to turn it off in the first couple of minutes to finding I was half way through the film and dying to know how it came out.  This is a film that just grabs you and pulls you along.

Oh, the wonders I've seen.

This is a one of a kind film that is going to make you laugh, make your mouth hang open, and delight the snot out of you.

AN absolute joy

Recommended for anyone who wants an atypical film that isn't from Hollywood.

HAMLET SYNDROME (2023) Kino Polska at BAM

HAMLET SYNDROME 
Before the Russian invasion of Ukraine five actors ponder Hamlet’s “To be or not to be…” speech in the wake of their experience with war. This is a kick ass film that mixes literature with the hard truths od warfare. Less about the speech than the damage done by war this is a film that will rock you thanks to the march of current events. This is a small gem of a film.

The Tragedy Of Macbeth (2021) opens Saturday

 

Joel Coen  takes on the Bard of Avon's Scottish play with wildly mixed results.

Shot in black and white and the Academy ratio this is a throw back to the golden days of Hollywood, German expressionism, Carl Dreyer's THE PASSION OF JOAN OF ARC and the theater, the film looks great. In actuality this film is almost certain to be nominated for numerous technical Oscars. Coen and his team have created a visual world that delights the eye at every turn. There are eye popping images all through out the film, anything with the witches, the cauldron scene, and the glorious shot of the death of Macbeth. Its a delight.

The performances are largely top notch. Denzel Washington is amazing in the lead. His madness makes me hoping that he wades into King Lear soon. The real discovery here is Kathryn Hunter as the Three Witches. Its a haunting performance that ill almost certainly bring her awards gold, including an Oscar because despite everything else going on she is the one actor you will remember above all others.

And as for the rest of the film, its all a series of problems almost all of them Joel Coen's fault.

At the post press screening at the New York Film Festival Coen spoke about designing the film so that the film constantly reminds us that the film is based on a play. He sought to meld the play as written with cinema. The trouble is the result is a film that is kind of dead.  Using long frequent close ups, like Dreyer did in JOAN OF ARC, he films the characters speaking to the camera/audience. It's an interesting idea but with the tight aspect ratio mixed with the lack of movement in the frame results in a the cinematic equivalent of having a character stepping forward and declaratively speaking their lines. Its a mode of stage acting that has been made fun of for decades (and resulted in my walking out on Christopher Plummer doing King Lear) because it's silly. Coen said that he wanted  to shoot the characters speaking to the camera, especially with the soliloquies, because he said most times they are done as voice overs and he didn't like that. Perhaps it doesn't work in some cases but filmmakers like Kenneth Branagh make them gripping living cinema. This is inert.

This close up way of doing things results in a wildly off kilter performance by Frances McDormand. She doesn't act her role but performs her role as if it's a showy one woman show of her greatest roles. I found much of it laughable and was biting tongue lest I be killed at the press screening. She is in a grand stilted stage production while the rest of the cast seems to be in a real cinema world.  I don't blame her entirely, since her husband's choice of framing the action essentially has her (and the rest of the cast) acting in a vacuum.

 The  framing of the action is a major flaw with the whole film. The close ups could be okay, but pretty much every other shot is a tableaux making everything static. The few actors in any scene are posed in artificial locations. Since he keeps the number of actors on screen small all the times the tableaus result in no one being connected to each other. As I said everyone is acting in a vacuum, or a large scale Zoom call. These are isolated people not humans interacting with each other.(Look at the scene where Macbeth is woken up to be told he has been promoted. It's separate shots assembled with no one sharing the same space unless thy are standing next to each other). This means we never really know who these people are and what their relationship is.

It's a situation made worse by his rewriting and tweaking the source material. There are deletions in the text that eliminates a lot of the exposition.  Its not always clear who everyone is. I say this not as a Macbeth newbie but as some one who has loved the play for four decades. I've seen too many productions to count and a good number of film versions but  despite being able to talk about the plot at length, I was frequently lost. Its not the cross cutting or the rearranging, it's  simply that where in a good production you can tell who everyone is, Coen has removed small bits that only allow you to know who is who if you know who says what line. He has killed any sense of who anyone is other than Macbeth and his Lady. He also reimagines the role of some characters such as Ross, who now becomes a kind of deus ex machina, moving some events forward (such his role at the end)

I can not imagine how lost someone who doesn't know the play will feel if this is the first version they encounter. Its everything that is wrong with most bad stagings of the play.

Coen's spatial problems continue  within the physical space of where things happen. Characters walk around the castle randomly, often going into the same set that is supposed to be a different location. Lady Macbeth wanders around doing "out out foul spot" in places that don't match other shots- and or a jutting cliff that just appears outside the castle. Yes, you can do that on stage, but you can't do it in film unless you construct it differently and lay a groundwork. Yes, Coen is going for effect but the effect is confusion. A continuing thought was "Wait where am I?"

Coen also grossly misreads Macbeth's character. Instead of a slowly corrupted good man, he's portrayed as a guy instantly ready to kill the king. Where did that come from? I understand you want him to be ambitious, but homicidal from the get go? That seems to be a rewrite of the early part of the play. What Coen doesn't seem to understand is that by making Macbeth ready to kill he lessens Lady Macbeth. She is some how diminished and less of a monster. Actually he makes the character completely unnecessary. She is supposed to be a catalyst to push him over the edge, but that's all gone. Why have her in the play at all then? The whole plan is staged as if Macbeth as planning it from the start (the letter). It removes the notion of real tragedy because he's a monster (Richard 3 eat your heart out) 

This feels like its a film made by a filmmaker who read Wikipedia and a few theories about the play and went with that

While I know this film delighted many at the New York Film Festival, this is a film that will never really leave the art house. Yes the cast will get it seen but I doubt outside of a handful of Shakespeare fans, few will ever return to or recommend this beautiful misfire.

Visuals aside this is the worst screen adaption I've run across, and there are some misguided film versions out there.

The Tragedy of Macbeth (2021) NYFF 2021

 

Joel Coen  takes on the Bard of Avon's Scottish play with wildly mixed results.

Shot in black and white and the Academy ratio this is a throw back to the golden days of Hollywood, German expressionism, Carl Dreyer's THE PASSION OF JOAN OF ARC and the theater, the film looks great. In actuality this film is almost certain to be nominated for numerous technical Oscars. Coen and his team have created a visual world that delights the eye at every turn. There are eye popping images all through out the film, anything with the witches, the cauldron scene, and the glorious shot of the death of Macbeth. Its a delight.

The performances are largely top notch. Denzel Washington is amazing in the lead. His madness makes me hoping that he wades into King Lear soon. The real discovery here is Kathryn Hunter as the Three Witches. Its a haunting performance that ill almost certainly bring her awards gold, including an Oscar because despite everything else going on she is the one actor you will remember above all others.

And as for the rest of the film, its all a series of problems almost all of them Joel Coen's fault.

At the post press screening at the New York Film Festival Coen spoke about designing the film so that the film constantly reminds us that the film is based on a play. He sought to meld the play as written with cinema. The trouble is the result is a film that is kind of dead.  Using long frequent close ups, like Dreyer did in JOAN OF ARC, he films the characters speaking to the camera/audience.. It's an interesting idea but with the tight aspect ratio mixed with the lack of movement in the frame results in a the cinematic equivalent of having a character stepping forward and declaratively speaking their lines. Its a mode of stage acting that has been made fun of for decades (and resulted in my walking out on Christopher Plummer doing King Lear) because it's silly. Coen said that he wanted  to shoot the characters speaking to the camera, especially with the soliloquies, because he said most times they are done as voice overs and he didn't like that. Perhaps it doesn't work in some cases but filmmakers like Kenneth Branagh make them gripping living cinema. This is inert.

This close up way of doing things results in a wildly off kilter performance by Frances McDormand. She doesn't act her role but performs her role as if it's a showy one woman show of her greatest roles. I found much of it laughable and was biting tongue. She is in a grand stilted stage production while the rest of the cast seems to be in a real cinema world.  I don't blame her entirely, since her husband's choice of framing the action essentially has her (and the rest of the cast) acting in a vacuum.

 The  framing of the action is a major flaw with the whole film. The close ups could be okay, but pretty much every other shot is a tableaux making everything static. The few actors in any scene are posed in artificial locations. Since he keeps the number of actors on screen small all the times the tableaus result in no one being connected to each other. As I said everyone is acting in a vacuum, or a large scale Zoom call. These are isolated people not humans interacting with each other.(Look at the scene where Macbeth is woken up to be told he has been promoted. It's separate shots assembled with no one sharing the same space unless thy are standing next to each other). This means we never really know who these people are and what their relationship is.

It's a situation made worse by his rewriting and tweaking the source material. There are deletions in the text that eliminates a lot of the exposition.  Its not always clear who everyone is. I say this not as a Macbeth newbie but as some one who has loved the play for four decades. I've seen too many productions to count and a good number of film versions but  despite being able to talk about the plot at length, I was frequently lost. Its not the cross cutting or the rearranging, it's  simply that where in a good production you can tell who everyone is, Coen has removed small bits that only allow you to know who is who if you know who says what line. He has killed any sense of who anyone is other than Macbeth and his Lady. He also reimagines the role of some characters such as Ross, who now becomes a kind of deus ex machina, moving some events forward (such his role at the end)

I can not imagine how lost someone who doesn't know the play will feel if this is the first version they encounter. Its everything that is wrong with most bad stagings of the play.

Coen's spatial problems continue  within the physical space of where things happen. Characters walk around the castle randomly, often goin into the same set that is supposed to be a different location. Lady Macbeth wanders around doing "out out foul spot" in places that don't match other shots- and or a jutting cliff that just appears outside the castle. Yes, you can do that on stage, but you can't do it in film unless you construct it differently and lay a groundwork. Yes, Coen is going for effect but the effect is confusion. A continuing thought was "Wait where am I?"

Coen also grossly misreads Macbeth's character. Instead of a slowly corrupted good man, he's portrayed as a guy instantly ready to kill the king. Where did that come from? I understand you want him to be ambitious, but homicidal from the get go? That seems to be a rewrite of the early part of the play. What Coen doesn't seem to understand is that by making Macbeth ready to kill he lessens Lady Macbeth. She is some how diminished and less of a monster. Actually he makes the character completely unnecessary. She is supposed to be a catalyst to push him over the edge, but that's all gone. Why have her in the play at all then? The whole plan is staged as if Macbeth as planning it from the start (the letter). It removes the notion of real tragedy because he's a monster (Richard 3 eat your heart out) 

This feels like its a film made by a filmmaker who read Wikipedia and a few theories about the play and went with that

While I know this film delighted many at the New York Film Festival, this is a film that will never really leave the art house. Yes the cast will get it seen but I doubt outside of a handful of Shakespeare fans, few will ever return to or recommend this beautiful misfire.

Visuals aside this is the worst screen adaption I've run across, and there are some misguided film versions out there.

Hamlet /Horatio(2020) Chain Film Festival 2021

The life and times of Hamlet are recreated by Horatio as a TV program in response to Hamlet telling him to tell his story.

Wildly uneven retelling of Shakespeare's Hamlet probably would have been better  on stage. This is the result of  the decision to film much of this is as if it was a stage performance. Why use a camera if you aren't going to do anything with it? Indeed if Horatio did have a camera wouldn't he have wanted  to do more than just do straight reporting?

I'm also mixed on the script which cuts the four hour plus play to an hour and a half. I understand this from Horatio POV but there still should be more here. And I won't go into the performances which ae all over the place.

Reservations aside the film does have moments. Some of the scenes play nicely and make this worth a look if you are a Shakespeare fan.

HAMLET/HORATIO  plays the Chain Film Festival vitually August 20, 7:00 PM - August 29, 11:45 PM, 2021 and in person Sat, Aug 21st, 8:30 PM @ Chain Studio Theatre For tickets and more information go here.

As We Like It (2021) NYAFF 2021

Updating of Shakespeare As You Like it into the modern world where the kingdom is a corporation and the characters  are gender fluid.

This is a good retelling of Shakespeare  made with joy and love. How you react to the film will be determined by how you react will be to the flashy style it is made. Its animation, fashion and craziness all blended together in the story of two girls looking for love.

I liked this film but I didn’t love it. It was a bit too flashy for me and it kept me from feeling the story had any weight. It was like watching some reality TV show but less serious. Don’t get me wrong I enjoyed the hell out of it but when it was done I was instantly ready for something else.

Measure For Measure (2020) hits VOD Friday

Aging crime lord leaves his apartment block when a tragedy occurs, leaving the his second in command in charge. Mean while a musician romances a refugee.

Downbeat reimagining of the Shakespeare play removes all of humor and light leaving us with a story of people just struggling to survive. It’s a moving tale powered by killer performances that breath life into it all in unexpected ways.

Truth be told the script is so good that I kind of wish it wasn’t tied in anyway to the play. Yes most of it’s stripped away to the barest of bones but at the same time even that slender teather kind of restricts this little gem of a film from fully inflating. A couple of times I kept wondering what this would have done if it had used a different road map then the Bard of Avon’s. Regardless of my quibbles this frequently stuns and is worth your time and money.

Ghost Light (2018) Oxford Film Festival 2019

It is very difficult to do a horror comedy or comedy horror film well. The trick in balancing the laugh and scares isn’t one many people know with the result that most films trying to be funny scary tend to be neither. When it works the films are absolute delights, which is what Ghost Light is, an absolute delight.

The film follows a traveling troop of actors who go to an out of the way summer stock theater in Massachusetts. The plan is for them is to reopen the theater with a production of Macbeth. When one of the actors doesn’t take care to follow the rituals concerning the play things go horribly wrong.

Once the film gets past an over explanation of the play’s curse, it just goes, managing to be both very funny and frequently chilly as the film earns its self-imposed description as a dark comedy. (Remember this is a horror comedy so bad things happen).

That the film works as well as it does is due entirely to the top flight cast. Filled with great actors like Cary Elwes, Carol Kane, Roger Bart, Steve Tom, Sheldon Best,  Tom Riley and Danielle Campbell who suck us in and drag us along through the spooky proceedings past all the bumps in the plotting. Particularly wondrous is Carol Kane. As someone whose mental picture of her is her wild and crazy comedies, he role here hearkens back to her early dramatic work in films like Hester Street. Yes, she is funny, but she is also so spot on with the drama that I think this maybe my new favorite memory of her.

I love this film. Yea I could probably nitpick bits of the plotting as things we’ve seen before, but since director John Stimpson manages to get the tone and the feel so right I’ll forgive any problems simply because it’s been much too long since any comedy raised goosebumps on my arms from the scares.

Highly recommended. Destined for a long life, Ghost Light is the opening film at the Oxford Film Festival and is highly recommended

Love-in-Idleness (2016)

Kim Noce’s LOVE-IN IDLENESS is a masterpiece. A lovely cinematic representation of a meeting between Bottom and Titania it is a beautiful marriage of music and image

There is nothing here beyond the meeting- but there doesn’t have to be- it perfectly sums up that moment when you meet someone with whom you form an instant connection.

Noce’s notes on the film speak of how the film ties into the story of Bottom and Tatania but I don’t think that reading is really necessary since the film transcends it’s connection to the play A Midsummer Night's Dream, to become something greater. Like another film from Mew Labs, Shaun Clark’s NECK AND NECK which reduced the story of Othello to its simplest form, LOVE-IN-IDLENESS stands completely on it’s own. While it helps to know who the man with the donkey head is, the emotion and the feeling is simply in the telling. Ultimately this the story of a man and a woman- that one has the head of a donkey and the other is the Queen of the Fairies is irrelevant in matters of the heart. All we need to know is really on the screen- the emotion is human and universal.

Discussing the deeper meaning is pointless. LOVE-IN-IDLENESS is simply a beautiful work of art. It’s a film that works on the viewer not like unlike a great painting or even the object of hearts desire- simply deeply and emotionally. It is a bolt of lightning that illuminates the nature of love.

Noce’s animation style of charcoal on paper is one that leaves behind the eased previous image. The erased marks deepen the emotion since it seems to put everything into a slow motion –stretching out each look, each smile, each touch. It’s as if the characters are vibrating with expectancy or from the touch of their lover. Forgive me, it’s hard to explain but anyone who has ever felt the electric touch of a lover will realize that Noce has captured an image of what that moment is like.

The image is a married to the work of composer Hutch Demouilpied who perfectly creates a mood. As good as Noce’s images are they are deepened by Demouilpied's music.

This is a truly a masterful film.

Track this one down.

Currently on the festival circuit LOVE-IN-IDLENESS plays this weekend at Monstra the Lisbon Animation Film Festival as part of their erotic shorts collection.

Shaun Clark is a genius and his film NECK AND NECK proves it

Shaun Clark is a genius.

Clark is a filmmaker/animator who makes films that crawl inside your brain and set up permanent residence. His film LADY AND THE TOOTH has stayed with me since I saw it at Fantasia. If you say the title I instantly see the film play out in my head.

Clark’s latest film is NECK AND NECK and it was announced yesterday as being part of the 70th Edinburgh International Film Festival and it’s even better than his last film.

The film is a version of one of Shakespeare's plays- I won’t say what, I don’t dare say what simply because in the films five minute running time it pretty much takes the three hour play and condenses it down perfectly. Watching the film I was struck by how razor perfect the film is. It’s the essence of the story laid out.

The reason the film works, and the reason that Clark is such a brilliant filmmaker is he not only uses words, but he nails the visuals. The visuals are half the film and the snake like characters manage to be both the actual characters and the subconscious representations of the psyche. Bodies entwine- literally. We watch as characters change as poison is poured into their soul and we see how a simple action can be misconstrued and lead to…

Well that would be telling.

This film is as good a short film as they come.

When I saw the film last week I had had a bad day. Things didn’t go right. I was way behind in stuff to review. I had received a copy of – earlier in the day but I didn’t want to see it. Then suddenly I said what the hell and I put it on. It was like watching someone catch lightning in a bottle. It was one of those films that got my adrenaline going- crazily I emailed Shaun Clark…

NECK AND NECK is a great film.

Shaun Clark is a great filmmaker. As some of you know I have a Kool-Aid List- a list of filmmakers who’s work is so good and so consistent that I’ve drunk the Kool Aid and will follow them anywhere. I really think Shaun Clark belongs on that list-he’s just making these films that just rock your world a couple of minutes at a time.

NECK AND NECK world premieres at Edinburgh and it would behoove you to make the trip to see this film because it will rock your world.

CHIMES AT MIDNIGHT is hitting theaters once more starting Friday

This is a piece I did way back in 2010 when Unseen Films  was not even 6 months old. It was a piece that had been suggested to Ken Fries by writer JM DeMatteis at a comic show. The piece not only concerns Orson Welles CHIMES AT MIDNIGHT but his version of Don Quixote and his way of making films.  With CHIMES finally hitting theaters Friday after a long absence I'm reposting this piece in the hope of getting you to go see it.


Chimes at Midnight is considered by many people to be one of Orson Welles' best films and one of the best or the best Shakespearean adaption on film. For me it’s not quite the greatest Shakespearean adaption ever on film, however I do think it contains some of the best work Welles did on film, as well as flashes of of some of the best Shakespearean moments on screen.

The film was the out growth of a stage production that Welles was doing which stitched together all of the Falstaff pieces from Shakespeare in order to create the story of the man from start to finish and which would give him a role that he could hold center stage for the whole evening. Welles took the production, and with the aide of some of the greatest English actors and actresses put it on film.

Let me begin with a confession by way of a long rambling aside.

While often hailed as one of the greatest filmmakers of all time Welles more often then not couldn't get the money to make a film. He would work through out the 1950's,60's and 70's trying desperately to get the money to make a movie. If you can't believe that an artist as great as Welles sold out and made some of the terrible films he did, you need to understand its because he needed the money to make the films that were closest to his heart. The result was that his personal films were more often then not were long in production, shot all over the world in a style that is best summed up as unique, at worst as choppy (in some films characters talking to each other never appear together because the shots were filmed years and continents apart), and very often many, if not all, of the voices were done by Welles after the fact because the sound was lost, never existed or retakes required an actor who was unavailable.

The sad thing about the films he made like this is that they have been cut up and mixed up by a variety of companies that did or did not own the rights which further complicates opinions about the films. A perfect example is Welles' Mr Arkardin which has been so chopped up that Criterion released a DVD edition with three of the many known versions.

If you look at the films he made in this manner or from this period it's pretty easy to spot them since they all have a certain feel coming from the choppy shooting schedule and economy of style. Some times the style and the feeling works and some times doesn't. In Chimes at Midnight the feeling works, Othello and Mr Arkardin its less successful

Another example is also his long in production film of Don Quixote which was put together in some form after his death.

Welles was working on Don Quixote for two decades. From the surviving footage it can be seen that the film had both a period setting and a modern day portion I really can't say more since Welles was cutting and re-cutting the film all along the way and so many people saw so many different cuts and sequences that its impossible to know if there ever was one grand plot line or if Welles was making it up as he went along (I vote he was making it up). And in typical Wellesian fashion Orson never had all of the footage in his possession so several sequences are apparently being held by investors who never saw any return on their investment.

After Welles died the surviving available footage (several sequences were unavailable due to investor liens) was cut together by director Jess Franco who worked with Welles on some productions and it was received with very mixed reviews. Some people loved it some people hated it. I think its a complete mess and if it weren't for some stunning sequences- say they windmills- I would argue that Welles wasn't that great a director as we thought. (Franco, who has taken numerous brickbats for his cutting of the film, has rightly stated that he did the best he could with what he was given.)

In all honesty I would dismiss the film and Welles except that since I saw the film I read several interviews by Welles and his collaborators that lead me to believe that the film was never supposed to be finished. Actually what I feel is that Welles at a certain point stopped making "films" as such and just began to crank out movies that he finished because he was contractually obligated to do so. Welles loved film and had these ideas and he just shot the film because it gave him joy to do so. I don't think he really wanted to ever finish anything because if he did he's have to stop making movies. Don Quixote was never finished because it was his toy and he never had to finish it. The rest of his films were finished because he had to contractually; or in the case of the Shakespeare films like Chimes and Othello because they were the Bard, whom he respected and had a beginning a middle and an end.

Chimes at Midnight is one of the films from the wilderness years that it seems very few people have seen. It is out on DVD but the company was small and unless you were looking for it you probably never noticed that it was available, assuming you knew the film existed at all.

The film is based upon Welles Five Kings play which condenses Henry IV,V,VI and bits of Richard III into one story. The film refocuses everything so its all about Falstaff from his appearance in the plays to his final exit.

Its a film that is clearly Shakespeare and yet strangely not. The film is very much real and alive and not the formal static productions that you see with many Shakespearean adaption (I loath Olivier's films for that reason). Yes Welles resorts to a formalness of presentation at times, but that is because he's using it for effect, mostly during the sequences having to do with the actual royal court.

At times the small budget seems to have forced the film into close up and into tight odd camera placements that work wonders putting us into the action. With out a typically huge Hollywood crew Welles could get int places that are small and cramped and feel very real. The fact that Welles shot the film in a stark black and white makes the film come even more alive since the film looks more like old photographs or movie footage that might actually have been of the events.

The performances are really strong, as they should be with people like John Gielgud, Ralph Richardson and Margret Rutherford in the cast. These people are English acting royalty and the words of the Bard are like the very air to them. Even Welles, in a role that was very close to his heart, is amazing. Here is one of the few times where he was actually giving a performance and disappearing into the role instead of just saying the words and ham boning it up.

The real joy of the film is that it isn't really Shakespeare. Its not the plays we all know in the order we all expect and as a result the film springs to life with a vibrancy that many films of Shakespeare's plays do not have. By cutting loose the words and the rough story from the source plays Welles has created a living breathing film that makes the words not lines of dialog but the actual words of the characters on the screen. The film has the feel more of events that really happened instead of a rigid series of events that are following a preset course. Its best summed by the question when was the last time you watched a Shakespearean performance and didn't know what was going to happen next? (I am of course assuming that you knew the material going in)

Regrettably the film is all but lost now because it's so off the radar. Unless you saw it before or unless you are a Welles fan odds are you've never seen it. I know being in love with the Bard is no guarantee you'd know about the film since a guy at work who can quote chapter and verse had never heard of the film until I mentioned it. This is a film that is in desperate need of rediscovery. As it stands now the film is out on DVD in the US from a very small company. I have a copy of that DVD but at the same time it was hard to come buy since it took my looking at several retailers to find it. Fortunately I've heard that a major restoration of the film is in the works and with some luck this film will get a major push back into the consciousness of film and Shakespeare lovers.

Definitely worth a look, especially if you don't like Shakespeare since this is a film that may finally make the words of the Bard click with you.

Opens at Exclusively at Film Forum in NY and Cinefamily in LA on January 1, 2016

Why you should see RAN at the New York Film Festival 10/2

Because of the way the screenings fell together with this year's New York Film Festival I haven't had time to get to coverage of all of the revivals the way I have in years past. I simply don't have time to write full reviews of all of the films. However there are a couple of films I have to mention even if it's just to tell you to go and see it.

Akira Kurosawa's RAN is Shakespeare's King Lear set in medieval Japan. The story tinkers with things in that instead of daughters the king has sons, and instead of just greed and lust for power the motives are more complex involving revenge. One character is more Lady Macbeth than anything in Lear.

Its an awesome film that proved that despite what some people may have thought, the old master hadn't lost a step.

If you've never seen the film you have to go. Its just one of the greatest works of cinema you'll ever see. Seriously you have to go see this.

If you've only seen the film on TV you also must go, I say this because if you've only see it on TV you've never seen it. This is a gorgeous widescreen film that was made to be seen big. Its a film that changes and becomes richer the bigger that you see it. The fact that this is a new restoration makes this even more a must see.

Go see this (and it's a Friday night so there is no reason not to go)

The film plays October 2. For tickets go here

On Further Review Much Ado About Nothing (2013)

I suspect I'll be joing her once fans of the film read my say

Josh Whedon’s small scale assault on Shakespeare is one of the more over hyped films of the year. Receiving some of the best reviews I’ve seen and receiving gushing word of mouth from acquaintances who’ve seen it, one would think that the film were the start of the second coming of the bard. Back in June, with the thought of seeing something special I headed off to see the film in between persoanl appearances of Jackie Chan.

Boy was I disappointed…

For those that don’t know, the plot of the film/play involves several sets of lovers who are manipulated by another set of lovers in order to cause all sorts of mischief. It’s an amusing romp that is incredibly light and entertaining when it has a cast that can create the right light touch, which is the case here. Frankly Joss Whedon has brought a cast together that knocks the play out of the park. They are great and wonderful and if this were on stage I’d pay to see it…

…and now you’re going to ask-what’s the problem beyond that?

The simply the film is at best low grade TV but more often than not it’s little more than a home movie.

Oh I know sacriledge but it’s true. This is a bunch of people staggering around a house drinking wine and reciting Shakespeare. Don’t get me wrong the recitation is wonderful, the problem there is no reason for how the action is staged or where the film is set. Yes, I know it’s the directors home, and I know it’s being done on the cheap (I think the cast was paid in wine) but this is supposed to be a grand manor instead we get a slightly larger than usual suburban house. Scenes take place in rooms for no clear cut reason- a children’s bed room with stuffed animals? People in the pool? No clue. The sequences look cool but are dramatically empty.

Frankly I got to a point where I stopped watching and just listened to the sound of people reciting with my eyes closed.

As an audio book its one of the best. as a film its dull as dirt.

Ian McKellan's Richard 3 (1995)

Possibly the best version of Richard 3 that I’ve seen is the Ian McKellan version.

I’ve seen (and reviewed) the Olivier version and it’s okay but it’s almost painfully formal. Olivier could be a wonderful but he had a knack for not being a directorial innovator. Arthur Miller tells the story of going to the theater with Olivier and seeing a show he thought was incredibly badly directed only to find out that Olivier had done the direction.

I saw Kevin Spacey do the show on stage, and while it was played more for laughs, often a catch in your throat variety, I found it more a collection of moments around a show-offy performance. It was designed to be all about Spacey at the cost of the play.

McKellan’s version rattled cages when it first was staged. Set up as yet another modern dress version, McKellan stripped out the poetry and meter of the lines and instead had people speak not in the verse but the way we do now. The words are all there but spoken as people do. The effect is an immediacy that many other shows lack.

When the show was brought to the screen and opened up all pretention of it being a show was gone. This was story of a cup in a fascist Britian…and it’s all the better for it.

The opening scene with it’s “Now is the winter of Our Discontent made Glorious Summer by this son of York” being set in a bathroom, is both heavy handed and incredibly brilliant. Yes the irony is way too obvious but at the same time it works almost because it’s so amazing that any one would actually think to do it.

Actually the film works because the McKellan and the cast all play it pitch perfect. This is some of the finest acting I’ve seen in a Shakepearean film ever. McKellan, Annette Benning,Robert Downey Jr, Dominic West, Maggie Smith et al are wonderful. There isn't a false note in the group, even though on the face of it (and especially at the time) you would  think there should be.

What I love is that ten minutes in the fim ceases to be Shakespeare or a Shakespearean adaption, the story we are seeing is just a story not anything with any baggage.

The film is a masterpiece. If you've never seen it you should, especially if you don't like Shakespeare...

Olivier's Richard 3 (1955) New York Film Festival 2012

Yes I own Olivier’s Richard 3 on DVD. I have the Criterion DVD, more for the extras than the film.

The film, a rather faithful version of the play, is good, but unremarkable. I know why it’s generally considered the red haired step child to Olivier’s Shakespearean film (Othello, Hamlet, Richard 5) There is a formalness to it, a stage boundness despite being opened up that keeps me from really liking it. For my money I’d rather see Ian McKellan’s version (and I’ll elaborate when a review runs in a couple of weeks).

The problem is that the costumes and many of the sets feel like costumes and sets. They feel like they belong more on the stage then on the screen. On the the other hand they do create a nice artificial spectacle that will look great on the big screen. The fact that they will look great big is enough to make me consider going to see the film when it runs on the last night of the festival at the Walter Reed.

The real interest in the film are some the behind the screen tidbits associated with the film. For example it’s the first film that was shown on TV on the same day it was released to theaters. The result was not a good one for the theater going audiences since some theater chains refused to show the film.

Is the film worth seeing? Yes. Is it worth seeing at the film festival? Only if you can't score a seat to the closing film Flight.

Caesar Must Die (2012) New York Film Festival

When I was studying for a semester abroad in London during my junior year in college (bear with me, this story does go somewhere), I was able to see, for astonishing student cheap rates, a lot of theater every week, and a lot of that was Shakespeare. This was 1983: the Royal Shakespeare Company had just opened their season at the spanking-brand-new Barbican Center, where they were able to offer several rotating plays. The National Theatre had been in its new home on the South Bank and offered a series of live plays on three distinct stages of different size and configuration. I saw some grand (and a few not-so-great) performances of A Midsummer Night's Dream, Much Ado About Nothing, Measure for Measure, The Taming of the Shrew, Henry IV Parts 1 and 2 (with Patrick Stewart as Henry IV and Timothy Dalton as Hotspur), and, at the RSC's base in Stratford, Julius Caesar. It was thanks to this total immersion in the plays of Mister Shakespeare that I became even more of a devout fan than I had been, and study of the Bard, his works and contemporaries became field of study in undergraduate and graduate school.

Still naïve and young then in 1983, however, I asked my drama professor why companies modernized Shakespeare. Why were productions of these Elizabethan area plays produced in later historical, or even modern drag? He gave me one of the most important lessons I've learned in college or after: "You tell me." He set this for me as my final term paper and opened doors for me at theater companies and production offices. I dug into the productions we'd seen, but traditional and contemporary, watched films of Shakespeare's plays: my first exposure to Peter Hall's amazingly way-out A Midsummer Night's Dream, Roman Polanski's Macbeth and Orson Welles's bafflingly brilliant Chimes at Midnight I'll spare you the length of my final paper and sum up the conclusion succinctly: Shakespeare is of the ages. His words and characters speak to our times as well as his own. Through modernized set design or post-Elizabethan historical costuming his stories become more than just a comment on the sixteenth century. Since then I've seen dozens of Shakespeare productions in this mode and come to love them: a later RSC production of As You Like It updated to the Edwardian era, Akira Kurosawa's Japanese Lear in Ran, Kenneth Branagh's bubbly and infectious Much Ado, Ralph Fiennes's brilliant Coriolanus as modern war tragedy, and the BBC's recent series of modernized Shakespeare Retold, especially the Damien Lewis/Sarah Parish newsroom re-setting of Much Ado About Nothing, with Billie Piper playing Hero as a weathergirl. Purists may scoff. I believe Shakespeare, however, would have loved it. His plays were for his audiences, to enjoy and laugh and cry, and if they weren't careful, they may just have learned something. We still do that today.


Which finally brings me to this grand re-imagining of Julius Caesar, Paolo and Vittorio Taviani's powerfully innovative Caesar Must Die. 1983 me might have been puzzled by it. 2012 me was captivated. We're among a group of prisoners in a high-security Italian prison. As they do each year, they're preparing to produce and act in a play, and we see Julius Caesar come to life as they rehearse in the cells, hallways, and yards of this grey concrete prison. The rehearsals present the events of the play in chronological order, in stark black-and-white—the Tavianis only use color for a wrapping sequence that presents the actual performance. They clown about, egos clash, they make breakthroughs. The director encourages them to play this in their own Italian dialects. Prison guards comment like a Greek chorus on the action and the characters. They take the events of Caesar and apply it to their own situations and lives. The text reminds one prisoner too much of his life outside, and he's morose and irritable. This is Shakespeare not only as drama but as a play itself; the microcosm of a closed community that mirrors the events of the drama. Is the prison Julius Caesar's stagnant Rome? Is Rome a prison?


The Tavianis's direction and design is majestic; the prison is more impressive and expressive than any stage. We come to know these men through an innovative technique: as they audition for their roles, they give their names and family histories in two different ways: defiant and despondent. It's brilliant shorthand for introducing us to the prisoners as players; their personalities and strengths are "on stage" immediately before us, even for such guarded men as these. You would say that this is the a brilliant portrayal of actors as prisoners, but... These aren't actors. These men actually are prisoners, and the annual drama production is a real-life program. What looks like a documentary is more powerful that we know (from the first, so I've misled you a bit) that these are real prisoners, in a true jail. The Tavianis's film is not a documentary—they given a fictional script to surround the events—but all the actors are playing themselves. And they are absolutely brilliant. I've told you previously about my so-far-favorite film of the New York Film Festival (Life of Pi), the most thought-provoking (Something in the Air), and the most beguiling story (Barbara). Caesar Must Die takes it for me in the Performance category, especially Salvatore Striano (Brutus) and Cosimo Rega (Cassius). They moved me to genuine laughter and freely-weeped tears, more than Branagh or Olivier or Barrymore.


When the company stands, shoulder to shoulder at the curtain call of their performance, there's great jubilation, infectious wide smiles and laughter, backslapping camaraderie and pride. Then, they're locked up in their cells again. Shakespeare and Rome is the only freedom they will have. "Since I got to know art," one of the prisoners says, "this cell has become a prison." Ironic how it opens our world for us too. Truly, Shakespeare is for the ages. Even fifteen to twenty-five years, or life.

Coriolanus (2011) A premlinary review

Ralph Fiennes's directs and stars in a modern day adaption of the Shakespeare play, and kicks major ass as a result.

We here at Unseen were suppose to see this film back in early October when the film screened at this year's New Yorker Festival, however illness,scheduling conflicts and familial medical emergencies prevented it. Earlier this week I took a day off to do Holiday shopping and took some time out to see the film in it's brief Oscar qualifying run before it gets a regular run next month.

The film is the story of Caius Martius, later Coriolanus, a roman general, who is running the empire. His methods have brought him into conflict with the Roman citizens and with several power brokers. As he is maneuvered into taking the position of Consul, things spiral out of control and he is banished. He then allies himself with his mortal enemy and marches on Rome.

The source says it's ancient Rome, however Fiennes says its the Balkans. This change of location and updating makes the film much more resonate with the world today. Watching the film I never thought about Rome. I thought about the politics of today. Sure it's always been argued that Shakespeare is timeless, but Fiennes has finally proved it.

The cast is incredible. Ralph Fiennes has taken on another role of a life time. There is a haunted quality to his performance, an unbridled intensity as the man who only feels at home in battle. There is a chilling exhortation to his wounded men to get up and continue the fight or he would turn on them, that says volumes about his state of mind. Brian Cox is wonderful as a senator who is Coriolanus' friend who is adrift among all the political moves. Vanessa Redgrave is equally stunning as the mother who is more butch than her warrior son. (I'm reserving judgement on Gerard Butler's performance since despite being second billed is given little to do)

Fiennes' work as a director is amazing. I can't believe that he hasn't done it before. Not only has he managed to make a stunning political film, but hes staged some really kick ass action sequences. I mean when was the last time that you thought about cranking up the sound of a fire fight in a Shakespeare film so that it rattles the windows? If you want another less violent reason to be impressed, realize that you will get sucked into this film and carried along even if you don't listen to all of the words. Trust me on this I didn't capture chunks of what was said, but I damn well knew what was going on. If you can move an audience completely and not have them catch all of the words you really have great talent.

Have I made it clear that I really liked this film?

I liked it so much that I knew about a half hour in that I needed to see it again. I was missing stuff... to that end I'm planning on seeing the film when the film opens wide in January and revisiting it in a review. There is just too much to this film that I need another pass through before I can fully write it up(hopefully with John and Bully in tow). Until I do, know that this film is really worth your time to see, especially if you don't like Shakespeare because this one transcends your expectations.

Hamlet- David Tennant (2009)

Dr Who does does Shakespeare once more in the BBC version of the Royal Shakespeare company of the story of what is rotten in Denmark. This time out it's David Tennant as Hamlet. He is ably supported by Patrick Stewart as his Uncle and his father.

A serviceable version of the play, It's the performances that make this a must see. Tenenant is amazing as Hamlet. He's a force of nature and gives the sort of performance that you can't help but watch, whether you want to or not. In all honesty my interest in this version came and went and there was a couple of times where I considered turning it off however watching Hamlet dismantle made stopping the DVD not an option.

The equal of Tennant was Patrick Stewart as both Hamlet's uncle the king and as the ghost of the Hamlet's murdered father. Talk about being intense.

For me the problem with the production is that as good as the performances are, most of the characters fail to register. I think the problem is that this version is too focused on the father/son and stepfather/ stepson issues to work out side of those narrow confines....

...actually I think the problem is that the two leads are so strong that they unbalance the rest of the play to the point where everything else is kind of laid waste.

That statement would kind of make you think that I'm ambivalent or hesitant to recommend the film, and that's not the case. This is really good film version of Hamlet, the trick is that you have to understand going in that the strength of the film is all about the performances. I wouldn't want to direct anyone who wanted a great understanding of the play to this (That would be to yesterday's full version)

Hamlet- Kenneth Branaugh (1996)

Kenneth Branaugh, who recently had his biggest popular hit with the Shakespearean tinged Thor, made the eclectic and wildly uneven full version of Hamlet.

How full is full? The film runs just over four hours and contains every bit of known dialog.Branaugh wanted to record the entire play for posterity. No film version had ever come close to getting it all on film. The trouble was that no one was going to pony up and pay for a version that ran over four hours long. Branaugh solved his money problems by coming up with two solutions.

First he said that if the producers would let him film the whole play the way he wanted it, he would chop out an hour and a half and make a more manageable version that ran some where around two and a half hours. The idea was that this shorter version would play smaller cities and would go out to schools. To the best of my knowledge this shorter version was prepared but I don’t remember ever hearing that the film ever screened. I know when I saw the film when it first played the only option was the full version, and that’s the version that I’ve only seen on TV and home video.

The second solution was the “stunt casting” of numerous name actors (Jack Lemmon, Billy Crystal, Robin Williams, among others) to play some of the smaller roles. It’s a hit or miss prospect with some of the wide ranging accents slightly distracting from the matters at hand (Brooklyn is not in Denmark the last I checked). On the other hand you get things moments like Charlton Heston tearing down the house with his performance as the Lead Player.

I really like the film a great deal. It makes much of the film much more accessible than some of the more traditional versions. Frankly the atypical versions such as this and the Mel Gibson version play better to me than the say the Olivier one.

No, it is not perfect. The performances are all over the place, the film rambles on and on and on with some sections in desperate need of trimming and some have argued that Branaugh’s rearrangement of some of the action (Get thee to a nunnery is near the very beginning) gives some people fits, but for the most part the film is a masterpiece of cinematic art. It’s a film that over comes all of it’s flaws to become something greater and over whelming.

On some level I think the film works simply because it beats the audience into submission…but in a good way.

Definitely worth a look see. Even if you don’t like Shakespeare you will probably find something in this behemoth that you can connect to which is something that you can’t say about many other Shakespearean adaptions.

Max Reinhart"s Midsummer Nights commentary

An amazing commentary track about the making of the epic, atypical film of Shakespeare's play is truly mind blowing.

Despite the fact that I will dip into the well of the Bard I am not a fan. Put me into the camp of those who feel he’s over rated. On a certain level its beautifully worded soap opera. Normally I have to have a hook to get me to watch a production, usually there has to be an actor I like.

In the case of this version of Midsummer the hook was the fact that I had only seen stills from the film, but I had never seen the film itself. Finding a copy of the film in a discount store I picked it up.

The film itself is a work of art. It’s a beautiful fantasy that rightly gave Warners a huge boost of prestige. It’s a film that is truly a work of art whose influence you can see in many films that followed including many MGM films and even Fantasia. On a certain level the performances are uneven, but then again none are truly bad or out of place. They are if nothing else interesting choices and probably close to what Julie Taymor’s disastrous Tempest would have been had she managed to pull it together. I like the film.

What I love is Scott MacQueen‘s audio commentary on the making of the film. It’s a wonderful look into the studio system and what happens when a stage director crashes into a film studio. It’s a battle of commercialism vs art where,surprisingly, both win.

It’s all here from the film’s genesis in the legendary Hollywood Bowl production (an aside the only thing wrong with the DVD is that there is no visual record of that production. Since the show is heavily talked about, it would have been nice to see something) to the films release and cutting down to a version that was screened at popular prices. We get the battle for casting. The endless battles over the look, of what they were going for, what they tried to shoot and how the studio screamed bloody murder since the footage was often so dark that it needed a very bright lamp to be seen (bulbs were something that many theaters skimped on and went for cheaper dimmer bulbs). There is the talk of the putting a section during the intermission which was going to be a classical music concert (the idea was scrapped).

Using memo’s and sections from biographies and other materials from the period MacQueen paints a wonderful portrait of how a film was made in the golden age of Hollywood that was a real eye opener to even my jaded film fanatic’s eyes.

I can’t recommend the commentary enough.

Best of all the DVD has many of the promotional bits that were mentioned during the commentary, the actor introductions, the A Dream Comes True piece which consisted of extra footage, plus trailers and other fun tidbits.

If you are a fan of Hollywood’s heyday you should see this. I don't know what else to say but go out and find yourself a copy and watch it. I'm going to guess that not only will you watch the film a couple of times, you'll also listen to the commentary a few more times as well since there is just too damn much to take in on one go through.

One of my finds of the year.