Well, it has been a wild ride. Henry VI, Part 1 was—for lack of a better word—horrible. Yeah, horrible pretty much sums it up. Henry VI, Part 2 was pretty good. It certainly did a lot despite the terrible groundwork provided by Part 1, and it gave me hope for this week’s rendition of Richard…
Last week, I gave a resoundingly negative review to the BBC’s continuation of The Hollow Crown series. Their rendition of Henry VI, Part 1 was actually an adaptation of Part 1 and Part 2, and cut out over fifty percent of the two plays, and was otherwise just kind of terrible. That didn’t leave me…
A few years ago the BBC adapted Shakespeare’s first four canonical histories Richard II, Henry IV Parts 1 & 2, and Henry V under the collective title of The Hollow Crown, and a little while after that I reviewed each installment as part of my ongoing Brush Up Your Shakespeare series. Well, the BBC recently…
Yesterday was William Shakespeare’s birthday. More importantly (this year), it was his 400th deathday. I feel like we ought to commemorate those more often. I guess it’s considered more cheerful and positive to do birthdays… yeah, fair enough. IMDb reckons there have been over one thousand films and TV shows based on Shakespeare’s works, including…
Macbeth is one of Shakespeare’s greatest plays, and probably his second best tragedy (after King Lear, obviously). It is also one of his most difficult plays. Make no mistake, it is a work of singular genius, but its brilliance teeters on a delicate support. It takes very little in a staging or adaptation to mess…
Previous Installments Believe it or not, there are times when reviewing movies made ten years ago based on the works of the most-reviewed writer in history, for free, for a limited readership is not the most rewarding thing I’ve ever done with my life. Other times, it means I get to watch a movie starring…
Previous Installments Gosh, it seems like a long time since I did one of these… probably because it’s been about ten months. After last year’s intensive Summer of Shakespeare, I guess I needed to take a break. Well, I’m back, and not entirely in a good mood this time. Why? Because… Anonymous (2011) The Plot:…
