Measure for Measure

Measure for Measure is one of Will Shakespeare's unknown treasures, so anyone who would even attempt a screen adaptation deserves our applause. The more so when, as here, the effort is reasonably successful.

The screenplay, all Shakespeare (although not all Measure for Measure--there is a brief dialogue borrowed from Romeo and Juliet) cuts away the diversions from the main plot, which unfortunately means that we lose most of the comic relief. Everything needed to understand the story is there, however, and it gets more punch from being less long-winded. The focus on the main plot means that there is little to divert us from the main characters. Isabelle is extremely well-played by Josephine Rogers, full of inflexible moral outrage both at Angelo and at Claudio; so much so that we are the more surprised when she bends at the end. Daniel Roberts' Angelo captures both his priggish exterior and tortured interior. Most interesting is the Duke (Simon Phillips) who is clearly shown at the beginning to be as corrupt and licentious as his subordinates. His objective in seeking reform is therefore clouded with hypocrisy, a fact which dogs him to the end, making the ending unsatisfying even when it is conventional, both to the characters and the viewer.

The supporting cast is mostly solid, although the actress playing Marianna is apparently Swedish and is hard to understand both due to her accent and her wooden performance. Her makeup is also bizarrely overstated, to the extent that she might have been intended to be a goth, but no explanation is given for why she might be Gothic.

Makeup is a recurring problem. Just about everyone looks unhealthily pale and Claudio in prison is the strangest of all, having cherry-red blood smears on his pasty white face. About the only time light and makeup get together is when Isabelle in the convent receives Lucio's plea to help Claudio. The brown and gold tones of the wooden background are nicely mirrored in Isabelle's skin tones.

Perhaps the unhealthy pallor is to underline everyone's unhealthy lifestyle.

The setting at a modern army base is intriguing, and perhaps was chosen to contrast a lack of discipline with an institution in which discipline is traditional and important. However, Shakespeare's setting in a red light district made the depravity seem natural whereas here it was a bit strained.

Thoughtfully written and directed, and acted with passion. It's worth a look if you can find it.

This is a fantastic play, and trying to put this on the screen is a commendable effort, but it cannot be denied that this film is a complete mess.

The modern setting is completely incongruent with the moral systems inherent in Shakespeare's play.

The delivery is wooden, and several of the lines are bundled or just wrongly pronounced.

The editing is vicious (hence the 80 min run-time) and so you lose the comic variety of the original play (Pompey and Lucio are severely sidelined).

Simon Phillips, as The Duke, gives by far the best performance, but when disguised as a friar, he seems to be acting like a blind man for no apparent reason and his disguise makes him look like John Lennon.

The cinematography is amateurish at best, and the restlessness of the camera gets very irritating very quickly.

I really wanted to like this, because it was such an ambitious concept, but for me, it fell totally flat, and seemed ridiculous more often than not.

The problem with heavy cutting of a Shakespeare play, and this is cut by about 60%, is that you take away much of what makes it a fully rounded Shakespeare play. In this case, the text and the cast is cut to the bone so that all is left is the main plot; the subplots, which comment upon the theme, have been completely removed.

One interesting element is the revealing of the Duke as deeply hypocritical, and hypocrisy is a key theme of the play. This is achieved particularly well at the end, and Isabelle gives him an appropriate response in the always ambiguous ending.

The film is a brave effort as an experimental production with what was clearly a miniscule budget but it has a number of significant problems which cause it ultimately to fail: 1. Its brevity - the cutting is simply too savage. 2. The budget meant that the production values are low. The sound, at least on the DVD, is terrible. There is substantial echo in the corridors inside which makes speeches sometimes barely audible; wind noise in the microphones when outside; poor balance causes music to be overwhelming. 3. The makeup is simply awful. Claudio's bloody face looks like it was done with a child's paint box and Marianne has purple arms in the final scene. 5. The lighting is rudimentary and the photography patchy, although there are some good scenes.

Finally, the transcription of the setting to the British Army is an intriguing but ultimately unsuccessful idea. The function of the Viennese court is so fundamental to the setting of the play that it doesn't translate to an army camp very well.

For students of Shakespeare and modern adaptations, this is a useful film to watch - and it is only 72 minutes of your time - but for a proper and enjoyable production, take a look at the BBC's 1979 TV adaptation.