Como Você Quiser

Seeing As You Like It, William Shakespeare's romantic comedy of mistaken identity brought back memories of an amateur production of the Carousel Theater here in Vancouver many years ago in which my son David played a small role. It was a wonderful presentation that thoroughly captured the genius of Shakespeare's delightful imagination. Unfortunately, the new filmed version by Kenneth Branagh with its big budget and professional cast is not in the least bit as convincing or entertaining. It is miscast, over produced, over acted, and simplistic with its multi-layered plot made easier to follow than Sesame Street.

Set in Japan in the 19th Century after the country was opened to the West as a trading partner, the royalty of England have been reinvented as wealthy merchants living on the Japanese seacoast. Neither the opulent backgrounds nor the conceit of the script, however, has any impact on either understanding or enjoyment of the play and the setting seems to be simply a marketing decision not an artistic one. The film opens with a kabuki scene at the court of Duke Senior (Brian Blessed). His brother Frederick, also played by Blessed with black hair, interrupts the proceedings to forcibly overthrow his brother's dukedom and the elder Duke is banished to the Arden Forest. Orlando, played by the Nigerian born David Oyelowo, and his brother Oliver (Adrian Lester) then proceed to fight over their position in the court.

Oliver, aligned with Frederick, entices his brother to take on a 300-pound sumo wrestler to all but certain doom but, as the script will have it, the underdog prevails in spite of a weight differential of about 150 pounds. In addition to being victorious at sport, he also falls for one of his well-wishers, the attractive Rosalind (Bryce Dallas Howard), daughter of Duke Senior. Fearful of her safety at the court, Rosalind, pretending to be a man and, taking the name of Ganymede from the handsome cup bearer to the Gods in Greek mythology, sneaks out with her cousin Celia (Romola Garai) and the clown Touchstone (Alfred Molina) to seek out her father in the Forest of Arden. Soon they are joined by Orlando who also fears for his life after a fight with his brother Oliver over their inheritance.

Before long, a bunch of other personages wander into the film including a melancholy philosopher named Jaques (Kevin Kline) who is described as "an exiled courtier", a young shepherd Silvius (Alex Wyndham) who pursues his reluctant girlfriend Phebe (Jade Jefferies), and others. Curiously, there are two characters named Jaques and two named Oliver, something that most writers would go to any length to avoid. The play is best noted for the cynical soliloquy chronicling the seven ages of man, "All the world's a stage and all the men and women merely players: They have their exits and their entrances, and one man in his time plays many parts", delivered with properly dour expression by Kline.

It would not be a Shakespearean comedy without some gender confusion and Rosalind, after noticing Orlando's love poems neatly positioned on trees all over their neck of the woods, knows that Orlando loves her. Approaching Orlando in her boy disguise as Ganymede, Rosalind endeavors to teach him the finer points of courtship if he would just pretend that he is a she. She uses her charm to seduce Orlando, but also is drawn reluctantly into a relationship with the shepherdess Phebe. In Elizabethan conventions, this meant that a boy playing the girl Rosalind would dress as a boy and then be wooed by another boy playing Phebe.

Quite naturally, this being a comedy and all, everyone ends up happy, (dramatized in a finale of the utmost silliness by Branagh) except for Jaques who, in character, decides not to return to the court. All the pieces are in place for the film to be successful but there are key elements that work against it. For the play to work at all, Rosalind has to be believable as a young man. If she is not, Orlando looks like a complete fool, and the play is robbed of its intended homoerotic playfulness. In this case, Branagh does not even attempt to have Rosalind look masculine and the scenes with Orlando in which he/she is teaching him how to express his love are unconvincing (unless you read it that Orlando goes along with the ruse and the author is simply making a statement about role playing, the masks people wear (himself?) in life, and the inauthenticity of self).

Rosalind is supposed to be pure, innocent, perhaps a little naïve but definitely virtuous. Howard, however, is very un-maiden like in appearance and manner and lacks any noticeable chemistry with her lover. She tries so hard to put the correct inflections in the words that she robs them of whatever poetry they might have had, conveying the impression that she is trying out eagerly for a grammar school play. This is Branagh's fifth attempt to put Shakespeare on film and I'm sure it won't be his last. After achieving considerable artistic but not financial success with the first three, he has opted in this latest film for less of an artistic statement than an overtly commercial approach. Love's Labours Lost was an unmitigated disaster – scorched by the critics and shunned by audiences. Unfortunately, As You Like It may follow in its path.

As You Like It is my favorite Shakespearean comedy, and my high expectations of the new Branagh version were not put to shame. Set in a lush, beautiful forest in an imaginary old Japan, populated by people of all races, this version is an innovative and modern one rather than a conventional and classical one - and it works.

The female main characters, Rosalind, Celia, Phebe and Audrey, are all immensely good, effortlessly throwing around both unbridled enthusiasm and unwavering character acting. In fact, Celia is near to outshining Rosalind; only her obviously bleached hair detracts from her charm.

The male characters are, sadly, far less distinctive, with the exception of Alfred Molina's Touchstone, who's delightfully silly - almost too much so. Kevin Kline's Jacques is not bad either, but he doesn't really steal the limelight to any great extent, the way he perhaps should. In a production as colorful as this one, Jacques greyness gets a bit lost.

(Edit: I will say that this version gains from repeated viewings. It is a great modern adaptation of Shakespeare's perhaps most joyous comedy.)

I did feel that a lot of the original text was missing, and this, as is so often the case with Shakespeare movies, is this production's worst shortcoming. Not enough of the delightful Rosalind rhymes which almost define the play ("Winter garments must be lined / So must slender Rosalind") are included, which is a grave, grave error in disposition. If this play was often made into movies, that judgment might be justified, but since the play is adapted so rarely, it cannot be.

The overall filming and cinematography are excellent, however, with plentiful gentle camera movement and many close-ups, focusing admirably on the strong emotions exchanged between the characters, and the language is fluid as well as florid, spoken in a very modern, sometimes even casual, tone, as we have come to expect from Branagh's very accessible Shakespeare films.

We are many who wonder why this film has not received a wide cinematic release. It has been shown only on a few film festivals, and this January it will be out on DVD, at least in Italy. Is it going straight to DVD without a run in international theaters? Why?? Is it really seen to be so obscure and uncommercial that no distribution company will commit to it? If so, distributors should be ashamed.

My rating: 9 out of 10.

An overthrown local monarch takes to the woods with a handful of loyal followers. His daughter also flees also, at a different time, following her true love (but dressed as a man). Only in Shakespeare do fathers/brothers/lovers not recognize each other because they're in different clothes.

Kenneth Branagh is good. He's very good. In fact, he's darn good. But he's not as good as he thinks.

He made a slight shift in locations for "Much Ado About Nothing" and it worked better than he could have hoped. He set Hamlet in a Ruritanian Denmark. Fine. I enjoyed it (helped along, I think, by the fact that I was just coming down with flu in 1996 and during the movie show my temperature shot up to 103).

But setting "As You Like It" in Japan was a risk. It also may be the only version some people ever see, which is a perversion. Whether it works is, of course, subjective. The movie's not bad but downbeat for a comedy. See it and make up your own mind.

(Fortunately, in "The Shakespeare Plays," comedies came out best, and the more conventional "As You Like It" with Helen Mirren is still wonderful, as is the Jacobean-set "Twelfth Night" with Felicity Kendall and the "Much Ado" with Cherie Lunghi; so anyone wanting more Shakespearean interpretations of these Shakespeare plays have those to fall back on. Get a region-free dvd/blu-ray player, if necessary.)

This version has Branagh's typical mix of his stock company (Brian Blessed, Richard Briars) and currently popular stars given a chance to display their acting chops. Some work better than others. In previous efforts Denzell Washington and Charlton Heston came off well; Keenu Reeves and Jack Lemmon, less so.

Shakespeare grew up near the forest of Arden and no doubt played there (as I did in a huge woods I grew up adjacent to) and remembered it in his manhood as a mystical place (as I do mine). He embued it with wonder, so much so the eggheads insist it's not that forest of Arden where "As You Like It" took place but in another of the same name. What was I saying about fathers and lovers not recognizing loved ones in different clothes? It's the same sort of thing.

I wished Branagh had made more Shakespeare in the 1990s when it was popular; but now I'm not so sure. Of course, funding is always a problem.

This version of "As You Like It" has one serious lack: Branagh himself. I like seeing him around but he remains behind the camera. I never wanted "Henry V," "Much Ado," and "Hamlet" to end. I watched the clock on this one.

But this version has a nice surprise ending. Stick around.

On the whole, I agree with the many reviewers before me who praise Kenneth Branagh in general and "As You Like It" in specific. So, I don't have to reiterate their comments here. I am writing to rebut the review by teacher_tom516 who completely misunderstands the movie, the play and the term "suspension of disbelief." Starting with the last, Samuel Taylor Coleridge called it "the willful suspension of disbelief," the tacit agreement made by the audience to leave reality at the door of the theater and accept the production's conceit as a temporary new reality. All theater, with the exception of the mercifully brief 19th century flirtation with "Realism/Naturalism", recognizes that it is an illusion to try to present "reality" on stage. Shakespeare certainly knew that and even tells his audience this in several of his plays (Henry V, Hamlet, The Tempest, A Midsummer Night's Dream, etc etc). His comedies are allegorical -- more subtly, so are his tragedies and even histories. His audiences accepted the premise without caviling over clocks striking in "Julius Caesar" and wild animals from different continents nonchalantly coexist. Shakespeare's Forest of Arden wasn't named for the Belgian Ardennes but taken from Lodge's romance "Rosalynde," from which Shakespeare cribbed his plot and characters. It is a magical place not found on maps -- it is the "Bitter Wood" of Medieval legend, the place where humans must face themselves, with or without Yoda. Arden was also Shakespeare's mother's family name. The writer plays the name game with the characters, seemingly unaware that Shakespeare's names are often chosen for their metaphoric associations. Falstaff is a "false staff" to Prince Hal. Why Orlando? Not because it's an Italian courtier's name, but because it's the Italian translation of Roland, the name of one of two legendary brothers-in-arms in the reign of Charlemagne, immortalized in "The Song of Roland." The other brother-knight's name was... Oliver! Also, It's Jaques, not Jacques, and may have been pronounced "Jakes", Brit slang for bathroom, which might be taken as ironic since he is such a pessimist, unlike his opposite, Touchstone, whose name might be taken as the iconic test of Truth. Do the hodge-podge of names in Hamlet disturb teacher_tom516? Claudius? Polonius? Laertes? Rosencrantz and Guildenstern!?

His biggest complaint is about the Japanese setting. Obviously, he didn't read the opening on-screen explanation Mr. Branagh thoughtfully provided for the edification of anyone interested in it. Is the Meiji Japan of the imagination be any less exotic than the locale of "A Winter's Tale" -- "the coast of Bohemia."? Bohemia doesn't have a coast -- it's completely landlocked. Oh yes, how absurd a scrawny kid could throw a Sumo wrestler? That's the whole point. Ever hear of Jack the Giant-killer? Beware people who confuse the truths of fairy tales with the factoids of spreadsheets. Yes, Shakespeare plays fast and loose with facts - so do creative directors interpreting his plays. As Miguel de Cervantes said, "One should never let facts get in the way of Truth." He also said, "Facts are the enemy of Truth."

Kenneth Branagh takes the Bard to Japanese setting the time being the late 19th century.As You Like It (2006) tells about Rosalind, the daughter of banished duke.She is raised by his younger brother Frederick, who took over dukedom.She falls for a young man named Orlando, but also she is soon banished by Frederick.Her cousin Celia leaves with her.They go to the forest of Arden, and they take the fool Touchtone with them.And also, Rosalind is disguised as a boy, and she goes by the name of Ganymede, while Celia goes by the name of Aliena.Also Orlando happens to be in the same forest, fleeing the wrath of his older brother.William Shakespeare wrote the original, pastoral comedy, around 1599 or 1600.I read it some time ago.Shakespeare sure knew how to write of love, and it is all well adapted to the screen here.And there are also mighty fine players in this play.Let's start with Bryce Dallas Howard, whose work as a boy is almost as good as her work as a girl.Romola Garai is a real treat as Celia.Brian Blessed is great both as Duke Frederick as he is as Duke Senior.David Oyelowo is terrific as Orlando De Boys.Adrian Lester is very good as his brother Oliver.Richard Briers gives a very fine performance of Adam.Alfred Molina is superb as Touchtone.And so is Janet McTeer as his love interest Audrey.Kevin Kline is brilliant as Jaques.Jade Jefferies is marvelous as Phebe.This may not be the funniest thing I've ever seen, nor was the play the funniest thing I've ever read.Maybe I'm too modern and should think more medievally.But it all works because of the words, and the grand feelings it has to offer.And sure I found myself slightly amused when Phebe went head over heels for Rosalind/Ganymede.Branagh shows us that Shakespeare works also in a new environment, in a new era.