The Tempest

I felt the treatment - being set during the Civil War - was original and refreshing. Peter Fonda was, perhaps, a little bit bland as Prosper/o but still a workmanlike performance.

I was a bit disappointed that Gator Man, the Caliban figure, was portrayed as merely a 2D villain, not the somewhat self-pitying Frankenstein's-monster-type Shakespeare paints.

I keep waiting for Peter Fonda to start acting. For someone who comes from such a talented family, it's a mystery to me why Peter Fonda can only play Peter Fonda trying to play someone else. And, that's the good news in this disappointing dog of an adaptation of The Tempest. A string of loosely connected ideas that only suggest a relationship with the Bard's great play is what we're served. The setting is the Civil War and Prospero's (here Guideon's) evil brother looks like an 1890's melodrama villain, complete with Snidely Whiplash moustache. I kept waiting for him to go "Uh ha hah!" which would have been a high point in this dreary presentation. None of the supporting cast was memoriable and Peter Fonda's lack of expression and wooden body movements made the lackadaisical story drag on and on.

The Tempest is the Bard's statement about the rage of man's unjust treatment of man. The only believable character was the Gator man, the Caliban counterpart. The transferrence to the swamp had possibilities but the Civil War setting just didn't make it. All in all, a very disappointing production. I saw it on video and would advise, if you want a Willy Shakespeare fix, save your money on this one. Rent something else, like Branagh's Much Ado about Nothing, or Kevin Kline in Midsummer's Night Dream.

The (DVD)movie "The Tempest", directed by Jack Bender, was published in 2001. It didn't make its way to German cinemas and neither the director or an actor were able to receive an important award for this movie. The movie refers to the Shakespearean play "The Tempest" which was published at the end of the 16th century. The director tried to create an modern version of this play, but failed. At the beginning of the movie the plantation owner Prosper gets in a conflict with his brother Antonio about the treatment of their slaves. Antonio sets his brother a trip and tries to kill him but with the help of a witch, Prosper is able to escape and flees with his daughter and a slave called Ariel to a small island nearby the Mississippi river. For over twelve years he has lived isolated on this island, till a lucky chance enables him to take revenge on his brother....If Prosper will be lucky you have to find out by yourself.

In my opinion this film is really a bad try to create a modern version of the original play by William Shakespeare. The story of the movie is confusing as well as the characters. Prosper doesn't have the same powers as in the tempest..... END OF PART I

...but it's still an entertaining TV movie. The transposition to the Civil War makes a nice change of pace, and adds a few subtexts (such as Ariel's servitude to Prosper/Prospero) that you might not otherwise see. Thankfully, they didn't try to make it a mini-series: at 90 minutes, it's just about right.

I had just finished struggling through the Shakespeare play, and found the core idea of the whole thing fascinating. Shipwrecks, magic, hallucinations, a beautiful girl, the evil protaganist. When I saw the ad for a tv movie, I knew I was going to like it and I did.

Katherine Heigl is one of my favorite actresses (Miranda) and she carried the role off just right. The special effects were convincing enough to not interfere with the enjoyment of the movie. My favorite part is Ariel morphing as he returns tot he ground. Plus it helped that Ariel was gorgeous.

Nice work...just glad it was a tv movie or it would have gotten mauled by the critics.