I usually review books, not films, but I have to make an exception here. It is rare that a film is so much more than the text, and here is a great example. Adapted and directed by Kenneth Branagh, starring himself and Emma Thompson, plus an all-star cast, this is my favorite summer film. It brings Shakespeare’s play to life beyond what you could best imagine.
First off, there’s the beginning. The entire film takes place at a huge villa in Tuscany. The opening scenes—and the transcendent music—evoke the peace and beauty of rural life and the excitement of the men returning from the battlefield.
This is catnip for anyone who has ever dreamed of renting a villa in Tuscany: vineyarda, women in flowing white dresses picnicking among the olive trees with music and bread and wine. Then come the stirring hero shots of the men galloping along the road. And—balm to my practical soul—everyone bathes and dresses themselves in clean linen to meet, all to the thrilling soundtrack. Such joy!
Of course complications ensue. So does comedy, this being Shakespeare, after all. Brilliantly paced, brilliantly acted.
At no point does Shakespeare’s language seem anything other than utterly normal, thanks to the quality of the cast. I have to single out Denzel Washington whose dialogue seems even more natural, if that’s possible. What a gift, to make this language seem everyday!
Films based on books or plays often cut corners to keep the running time down to the standard limit. Often they choose one theme or story line among many to follow. This is the rare exception where the film exceeds the reading experience.
There is so much joy here, so much celebration of life! Give yourself the gift of streaming this film today. With a hey, nonny, nonny!
Is there a book or play you’ve read where the film is actually better?
Since you’ve mentioned “Much Ado About Nothing”, you’ll have to forgive me for playing my role here as The Bragging Father.
In the area where we live (near Brattleboro VT) there are a number of resources for youth theater. All of the high schools in the area have active theater groups, and, more particularly, Brattleboro is blessed in being the home of the excellent (and very productive) New England Youth Theater [NEYT].
Both of my daughters were very active in the theater groups. My older daughter, Maera. primarily on the production/backstage side of things, and my younger daughter, Asah, in acting.
Now, it is simply a fact of life that one aspect of such local, high-school-centered group is that the casts tend to be rather heavily tilted toward the availability of young women actors. Even in cases where the proportions happen to be evenly balanced performing, a play like, say, Shakespeare –where the majority of parts are male– can still be problematic.
As a result, over her high-school career my (younger/acting-focused) daughter developed quite a reputation for her acting of roles originally written form men. In some cases this involved simply swapping the gender of the character (e.g. in the NEYT production of “The Miracle Worker” when she played the –originally male– role of the teacher of Annie Sullivan as a woman). And in other cases playing the part as a “trouser role” (i.e. in “drag”), as when she played (to great success I might add) the role of Bottom (complete with transformation to a donkey) in her high school’s production of “Midsummer’s Night Dream”.
But her greatest success was in NEYT’s “Much Ado About Nothing” in which she played the sinister, villainous Don John. (Played by Keanu Reeves in the movie above). The transformation was spectacular. She cut her dark, shoulder=blade length hair to a quite short style and donned a quite realistic looking burnt-cork beard-stubble. But the more particular point is that she was known as an especially sweet kid, and she had several people come up to her after the performances and comment on how scary she had been on stage.
Now jumping ahead a couple years until her first year in college where, it turns out, the university’s theater group announced they were staging a production of “Much Ado”. She auditioned and ended up playing –again quite wonderfully– the female lead of Beatrix.
So the transformation was complete: From Don John to Beatrix. Resulting in her being, what I suspect, is one of a very few –if not the only actor– ever to have played both roles! 😉
How wonderful! And a lead role in her first year is pretty amazing in and of itself. I hope Maera, too, is continuing to work the so important production side.