FISHCAKE

This is a pretty good vengeance crime tale: released English convict comes to U.S. to find out what really happened to his dead daughter. Finding out she was likely murdered, he sets out to "get" the perpetrators. That's about it, but a heck of a lot of involved action takes place before the denouement. I won't say what that is, but if you can sit through all the flashbacks, flash forwards, and flashbacks within flashbacks, you will find it rather startling. The director/editor seems rather reluctant to get on with telling his tale. Is this sensible editing? Personally, I like straightforward story telling, but directors and editors these days don't think they have done their job unless they constantly call attention to themselves. This kind of thing is not ART. It is just self-indulgence on the part of the production team. If you can tolerate all this, you'll get some excellent acting and a satisfyingly complicated plot, with effective suspense almost from the beginning. In the end, there seem to be almost as many dad bodies as in a Shakespearian tragedy.

Notice that in my "one-liner" I did not say "Shakespearian play". The fact is many scholars over the years have doubted that TITUS ANDRONICUS is a play by Shakespeare. The most many will allow is that "the Bard of Avon" touched up a play by George Peele and/or Robert Greene, with maybe a few lines by Marlowe. If so, this would account for the fact that TITUS is so different from the rest of Shakespeare. If you polled a goodly list of afficionados of "the Bard" as to their least favorite play by him, TITUS would likely head the list. My own least favorite is TWO GENTLEMEN OF VERONA, but no matter. TITUS really isn't very well constructed, and the language, though glorious Elizabethan, is not quite up to Shakespeare's best. The violence, blood, and brutality of TITUS is mitigated in part by the beautiful Elizabethan language, even if it is second rate.

TITUS appears to have been first performed circa 1593 and was wildly popular then and for fifty years after. Young Shakespeare would certainly have recognised the commercial value of such a violent revenge play, and if he didn't actually write it would likely have gladly improved it for his company to perform. In a way the Elizabethan craze for violent plays parallels the modern era when gore, brutality and violence so permeate the cinema and television. They didn't have all the special effects then, but they had lovely words to make up for it.

This film contains a number of anachronisms, inserted no doubt to prove that "Shakespeare is timeless". They don't have to prove it to me, but perhaps younger viewers may need some convincing. TITUS, of course, is absolute fiction, and the anachronisms within the play itself don't really matter. Supposedly the action occurs in Rome, but a Rome that never was. No Roman general in the time of the Emperors ever fought a war with the Goths, and there never was an Emperor Saturninus or a General Titus Andronicus, though there were some types like Saturninus. Nero and Caligula come to mind. I won't dwell on the plot except to say that returning General Titus turns down the job of Emperor, but supports Saturninus instead. He lives to regret it. Saturninus marries captive Goth Queen Tamora, who naturally hates Titus and turns out to be a libertine into the bargain. There is a Moor, a hanger on at court who is Tamora's secret lover, and a thoroughgoing villain. He, Saturninus and Tamora manage to wipe out most of what remains of Titus' family, with the result that Titus swears revenge and seeks outside help from his former enemies, the Goths, to get it. Tamora's sons, also not anyone's favorite bridge party friends, rape Titus' only daughter, Lavinia, and cut off her arms and tongue to prevent her identifying them. Is that brutal enough for you?

The film itself is beautifully realised, with sure handed direction and great photography that is used creatively to set mood and character. Makeup is also used to establish character. You may think the editing is a bit choppy, not like Shakespeare's smooth cinematic approach to linking scenes. Here the fault is mostly due to the original. TITUS ANDRONICUS is rather poorly put together and perhaps the production team decided to keep this in the film. There are many great performances to savor. Hopkins seems to live the role of TITUS and Alan Cumming gives us a really degenerate Saturninus. Jessica Lange is effective as Tamora, but perhaps a shade too appealing. Here though, I may be wrong. To wreak her havoc Tamora had to appear appealing and conceal her inner villainy. If you don't weep a few tears over Lavinia as portrayed by Laura Fraser, you are hard hearted indeed.

It is said that themes and characters in TITUS foreshadowed things to come in Shakespeare's work. Maybe so, but he never did anything else resembling the viciousness in this play, though some violence does occur here and there. The depraved Moor, Aaron, may be a prototype for Iago, or even Othello, but those villains had some motivation. Aaron is just pure evil. This film is worth a watch for lovers of the Elizabethan language, and if it isn't really Shakespeare, how often do you get a chance to see a play by George Peele and/or Robert Greene?

Just what is too long for a rendering of Shakespeare's HAMLET? If, like me, you love every word gem of the Bard, there is no "too long", even a tad. Bertram Kliman's "Three Text Hamlet" gives the First and Second Quarto and the First Folio versions in parallel columns. The first two are much shorter, and most scholars and dramaturgs use them only for emendations to the Folio text. It looks like Kenneth Branagh has used just about all of the First Folio, with maybe a pick here and there from the Quartos. Whatever, he has created a magnificent film. Casting, background, direction and camera work defy criticism. Using Blenheim Castle as Elsinore and moving action forward in time does make for some of the usual anachronisms, but then Shakespeare was guilty of plenty of these himself. In any case, the problems are deftly handled. Treat yourself to a splendid HAMLET!