Shakespeare in Love (1998)

Directed by John Madden. Starring Joseph Fiennes, Gwyneth Paltrow, Colin Firth, Geoffrey Rush, Ben Affleck, Tom Wilkinson, Jim Carter, Judi Dench, Simon Callow, Rupert Everett, Martin Clunes, Imelda Staunton, Mark Williams, Anthony Sher, Daniel Brocklebank. [R]

Fanciful period romance imagines a love affair between playwright William Shakespeare (Fiennes) and the daughter (Paltrow) of a prosperous merchant, which inspires the plotting of the play he is working on: Romeo and Juliet (first a comedy, then a tragedy). The leads are adequate, some of the supporting players are quite droll (Rush as a theater impresario, Wilkinson as a moneylender bitten by the acting bug, Dench as the tart-tongued Queen Elizabeth), and the sets and costumes are of a high caliber. What brings this one down is Marc Norman and Tom Stoppard’s shambling script, which is wretchedly “cutesy” and glib with all of its winking allusions, and so soggy when flinging woo that it actually cheapens quotes from the Bard himself! Co-produced by Harvey Weinstein, whose aggressive award season campaigning “bought” the film seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Actress (Paltrow), Supporting Actress (Dench), and Original Screenplay. Later adapted into a stage play.

57/100