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Featuring exclusive film previews, interviews and much more, this is the place for anyone slightly obsessed with cinema.
Featuring exclusive film previews, interviews and much more, this is the place for anyone slightly obsessed with cinema.
16 Aug 24
When we think about literary adaptations in cinema there are many authors whose work is synonymous with the medium: John Le Carre, Agatha Christie, and Stephen King all come to mind. Yet even combined, the canon of films based on their writing doesn't begin to touch the number of feature-length adaptations of one William Shakespeare. Estimated at over a thousand films, these plays continue to lend themselves to new and innovative interpretations — but after so many attempts, what does it mean to adapt the words of Shakespeare?
This reDiscover season highlights the diverse range of approaches to adapting Shakespeare through six distinctive directors. Excess or restraint, faithful to the text or loosely interpreted, tragic or comedic: these six films may be worlds apart, but each plays a part in bringing The Bard's worlds to life.
- Johnathan Kirk, Season Programmer
Some of you may (like myself) have been lucky enough to see Akira Kurosawa's other two Shakespeare adaptations on the big screen here at Picturehouse, with Ran appearing in our 2023 Kurosawa retrospective and Throne of Blood in our 2021 Japan season. It's only right that his lesser-seen Hamlet adaptation, The Bad Sleep Well, be given the same treatment as the opening film in our Shakespeare season.
Opening perhaps unexpectedly to a media frenzy at a marriage ceremony, it appears nothing is sacred and unchecked corporate corruption has no jurisdiction – even a wedding speech can be interpreted as a man "pleading his case to the prosecutor". Our 'hero' in this tragedy is Koichi Nishi, played by a clean-shaven Toshiro Mifune, seeking to avenge his father's staged suicide by infiltrating and bringing down the corporation that killed him. Caught in the crossfire is Nishi's new wife Yoshiko, the company President's daughter, who he has fallen in love with amidst his schemes.
Kurosawa's Shakespeare adaptations are often associated with grandeur and violence, though this is a much more intimate tale. Drawing visual inspiration from film noir, the characters exist in the murky shadows of right and wrong. Similar to Hamlet, Nishi is constantly second-guessing his actions in pursuit of revenge; "It's not easy hating evil, you have to stoke your own fury until you become evil yourself". Kurosawa weaves a tale that is bitter, angry and absent of hope, ultimately condemning the titular thesis to a universally tragic reality.
– J.K.
The open road is home to our next pair of Shakespearean vagabonds: River Phoenix as a narcoleptic hustler, and Keanu Reeves as a mayoral heir rebelling against his destiny. The pair form an unlikely companionship as they embark on a journey across state and country lines in search of truth, identity and belonging.
My Own Private Idaho embodies all the stylistic trappings of the New Queer Cinema movement (of which director Van Sant was a pioneer), most notably in its irreverent visual language — seashells, adult magazines and The Simpsons doing the talking when its characters can't find the words. Its heart lives somewhere far more subdued and serious, cleverly using genre and style in a similar way to Reeves' character, as an identity to put on to project the reality it wants us to receive. Van Sant opts for the most honest moments to be stripped of flair, making the expression of its most tender feelings all the more impactful — looking at that campfire scene in particular. It's a landmark queer film that's less concerned with being explicitly about queerness, and more with the way it ends up masquerading itself in all facets of life, as strange, sad, and wonderful as it can be.
Inspired by Van Sant's own viewing of Chimes at Midnight, Idaho riffs on Shakespeare's Henries IV & V, replacing its dominion with the seedy underbellies of '90s American suburbia. Studio executives tried to push back on the Shakespearean element during production, but Van Sant thankfully stuck to his guns, lacing the original Shakespearean dialogue with a healthy dose of '90s Pacific Northwestern-isms to raise the emotional stakes of a story with just as much to say about humans and how they relate to one another as The Bard did all those years ago.
– Hope Hopkinson
In fair Verona, frantic zooms, dizzying cuts and over-cranked imagery is the name of the game: this unashamed stylisation very much emboldens Baz Luhrmann's approach to adaptation. Despite the uncompromising modernity, the film is staunchly committed to the original text, earning its full title of William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet. Amidst the juxtaposition of the title is a film at war with itself, a conflict that finds its beating heart in its soundtrack. It's unshackled from any literary constraints through the liberation of Kym Mazelle's Young Hearts, Run Free cover, the longing of Des'ree's Kissing You, and – of course – the indelible version of Everybody's Free by Quindon Tarver.
The Montagues and the Capulets: a timeless quarrel between two of the city's most important families. When the two titular adolescents (Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes) meet across a fish tank and fall in love, they kick off a chain of events that will result in bloodshed, chaos and the infamous suicidal conclusion.
The use of religious imagery can be found in the original play and you'd struggle to miss it here too with crucifixes, angels and conveniently framed Virgin Mary statues. Critics may perceive a vulgarity in Luhrmann's direction, but it derives from a sincere adaptation of the text. He perceives Shakespeare as someone who "would make a 'movie' movie – he was a player". Though the two seem polar opposites at first glance, this adaptation is a testament to Bill and Baz being two sides of the same, sometimes crude, always wholehearted coin.
– J.K.
The novelty of a contemporary Shakespeare adaptation has always drawn audiences in, but few have been bold enough to transpose the Bard to a futuristic setting. Enter Fred M. Wilcox with 1956's sci-fi Forbidden Planet, an extremely loose adaptation of The Tempest set in 2200AD. Featuring one of cinema's most innovative scores (or 'electrical tonalities') and helping pioneer the iconography of the beloved android companion with Robby the Robot, Wilcox's vision of the future defined Hollywood science-fiction for a generation.
Starship C-57D's year-long rescue mission culminates in bewilderment when they discover only one survivor on the planet Altair IV, who promptly tells them to keep on driving. The crew remain steadfast in their investigative duties much to the annoyance of our Prospero - Dr. Edward Morbius - seemingly the sole inhabitant of the planet alongside his extraterrestrially born daughter Altaira and Robby the Robot (interdimensional stand-ins for Shakespeare's Miranda and Ariel).
The film owes as much to Freud's psychoanalysis as it does to Shakespeare, with the evil quite literally being "the monster of the Id". Though the aforementioned premise is where most note the similarities to The Tempest, Shakespeare's work does offer a fascinating framework for examining thematic parallels, from dominion over magic or technology to the destructive desire of human nature. Lines such as "Let him be buried with the other victims of human greed and folly" would fit just as well in the Globe Theatre as they do here in this elevated B-movie classic.
– J.K.
How do I hate thee? Let me count the ways. At the turn of the millennium, Clueless sparked a wave of canon-goes-to-high school – lively, postmodern, light-touch adaptations of classic work, aimed squarely at the booming population of teenage Gen X theatregoers. 10 Things I Hate About You represents a star student of this cycle, drawn from the most unlikely material: vicious comedy The Taming of the Shrew (or 'How to Subjugate a Wife in 10 Days').
Gil Junger directs a screenplay from pop culture powerhouse duo Karen McCullah and Kristen Smith (Legally Blonde, Ella Enchanted), transplanting the action to a Seattle high school where titular shrew Kat Stratford (Julia Stiles) is the only thing preventing her popular younger sister from dating. But when a group of boys (namely Joseph Gordon-Levitt and David Krumholtz) scheme to pair Kat off with delinquent Patrick (Heath Ledger), the unlikely pair soon find they have more in common than they realised.
Adapting Taming's gendered comedy to the modern world is no mean feat, and 10 Things is a perfectly-pitched post-feminist send-up. Much as English teacher Mr. Morgan (Daryl Mitchell), rapping in iambic pentameter and setting assignments to rewrite sonnets, encourages his sceptical class to find contemporary relevance in a seemingly archaic text, McCullah and Smith place the bard's satirical bite within the pleasures of the popular. Perhaps they agree with Mr. Morgan: "I know Shakespeare's a dead white guy, but he knows his shit, so we can overlook that."
– Lucy Fenwick Elliott
Another iconic filmmaker with three Shakespeare adaptations, Orson Welles' visually arresting directorial style is simultaneously kinetic and precise in this epic saga. The Henriad plays out as an almost entirely new play with Welles' Falstaff taking the principal perspective. It is not only one of the finest Shakespeare adaptations, but also Orson Welles' favourite Orson Welles film: "If I wanted to get into heaven on the basis of one movie, that's the one I would offer up."
Sir John Falstaff leads a ragtag band of depraved vagabonds, notably including King Henry IV's son and heir to the throne, Prince Hal. As the king's health worsens and a mature future beckons, the inevitable fate of Falstaff and Hal's relationship reveals itself. It's another tale of treachery in a filmography defined by betrayal; both thematically, and often in the production itself.
Though the screenplay is a faithful representation of Shakespearean text, it isn't a traditional adaptation of a single play. Primarily taking inspiration from Henry IV Part One and Two, the film also borrows elements of Richard II, Henry V and The Merry Wives of Windsor. It's the character of Falstaff across these works that Welles was most attracted to bringing to life, which he does spectacularly. If Forbidden Planet takes loosely from Shakespeare to tell a futuristic tale, Welles' approach is one of radical reverence. Both Wilcox and Welles use the original writing to create something transformative that only cinema can achieve – even if their relationships with the text couldn't be more different.
– J.K.
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