Twelfth Night
|
List Price: Our Price: $4.89 You Save: $10.09 (67%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Category: DVD See more DVD releases |
|---|
Buy this DVD movie at online store in your country
Canada
Canada
Movie Reviews of Twelfth Night
Movie Review: Breathtaking
Summary: 5 Stars
There have been many great Shakespeare drama adaptations, but Trevor Nunn's Twelfth Night is outstanding even among the greatest. It is wonderful how sensitively and excitingly he handles the issue of identity (girl disguising herself as a boy) and identification (male-female twins)problems.
The major character is Viola, who after losing her twin brother (played by Stephen Mackintosh very convincingly), is forced to disguise herself as a boy to survive in a strange and hostile land (namely Illyria which is at war with her home county, Messaline). The introductory scenes (not included in the drama) showing how brother and sister, sharing a strong bond of affection, lose each other, how dangerous it is for a citizen of Messaline to set foot in Illiyra and how Viola is transformed into a boy give the story a very good frame. The scenes where Viola is being transformed are great, showing how sensitive this girl is, how difficult it is for her to pretend, yet she musters all her courage to hide her pain over the supposed death of her brother. But struggles are not over as she also has to hide her passionate love from Orsino, the Duke of Illyira whom she serves.
Her position is twofold difficult: she soon becomes Orsino's confident, they get really close to each other so she finds more and more difficult to hide her feelings from him; but to ease Orsino's sufferings, she undertakes to act as a "courier" for pursuing his hopeless love, the Countess Olivia.
Then comes another Shakespearean turn of the screw: Olivia, who won't hear of Orsino's passion, falls for Cesario/Viola. In the meantime, Sebastian, thinking her beloved sister, Viola is dead, sets for Illyria as well ...
As it is a comedy all things messed up will sort themselves out at the end, however, this is not a light comedy, the shadow of the tragic is hovering over the whole drama shaped in one of the subplots. The whole film seems to balance at the very narrow edge of tragedy and comedy all the time despite the many hilarious moments.
The most wonderful scenes are the ones of Cesario/Viola and the Duke Orsino (a very sexy Toby Stephens)being together. Nunn is actually showing the emotional and subtle sexual attraction the Duke feels for his "manservant". Absolutely brilliant!
Imogen Stubbs personificates Viola superbly: an upright woman, who, despite the disguise she is forced to wear, is the most honest of all, especially compared to the characters of Orsino and Oliva, both of whom are deluding themselves by imaginary feelings.
The whole cast is wonderful from Helena Bonham-Carter to Ben Kingsley. Music and costume all fit in amazingly with the whole atmosphere of the drama.
Movie Review: A classic adaptation
Summary: 5 Stars
Acclaimed director Trevor Nunn's film is a classic adaptation of the third of Shakespeare's mature comedies (the others being Much Ado and As You Like It). Twelfth Night is the darkest of these three plays, beginning with Orsino's famous opening soliloquy and continuing its conflicted heroines, the cross-dressing Viola (Imogen Stubbs) and the moody Olivia (Helena Bonham Carter), both of whom are mourning lost brothers. The puritan steward, Malvolio--played masterfully by Nigel Hawthorne, whose appearance recalls famous Malvolios from play posters of bygone eras--is seething with sexual frustration, revealed only when tricked into it via a letter supposedly written by Olivia, yet penned by the tricky servant, Maria (Imelda Staunton). Maria's plotline is wonderfully augmented in this film by the clowns, Sir Toby Belch (Mel Smith), Sir Andrew Aguecheek (Richard E. Grant), and Feste (Ben Kingsley).
Nunn's adaptation is distinctive in three ways:
1. his realignment of scenes to emphasize similarities in seemingly disparate circumstances (e.g. the theme of madness, wherein Viola's lost brother Sebastian (Steven MacIntosh) wonders if he is mad even as Malvolio has a nervous breakdown in the dark room). The cuts he makes in the original text are equally appropriate to the change of medium: the story is essentially intact, with an opening non-Shakespearean twist that emphasizes shipwreck as the originating event.
2. Ben Kingsley's emphasis on the revenge motivating Feste--the fact that this seemingly merry fool has a thin skin when Malvolio upbraids him, and lords it over the broken steward at the end of the play. Though this darker interpretation of Malvolio is not the usual happy-go-lucky goof seen too often on North American stages, the text itself does warrant this way of seeing him, and it gives the character much more complexity.
3. The homoerotic attraction between Duke Orsino (Toby Stevens) and Cesario (Viola in disguise)--again, warranted by the text itself--is more fully developed than in many productions, and again, it increases the complexity of Orsino's character even as it emphasizes Viola's intense desire for him even as she is unable to break out of the identity she has created for herself in Orsino's court.
Beyond all this, the film is lush in its use of color, its landscapes and interiors--a delight to anyone who understands and appreciates the complexities of Shakespeare's characters. One only wishes Nunn would continue making films of this sort. I'm waiting for a good adaptation of The Tempest!
Movie Review: Splendid!
Summary: 5 Stars
Many people might be compelled to see this film after seeing Shakespeare in Love (Miramax Collector's Series). This is certainly not a bad thing, and there are in-fact allusions to 12th Night in SIL w/all the gender-switching that is goes on in both. Of course, you don't realize you're being "set up" until the end of SIL, but that's part of the fun!
This is a very well-done Shakespeare on-screen production. While plays are all well & good, there is something to be said to seeing Shakespeare filmed outside, inside of castles & w/lavish sets. While some purists may not like it, I think it's good for his plays to be displayed thus.
The acting in this film is top-notch. You can never go wrong w/Ben Kingsley, and he is stellar as the sort of "rudder" character of the story. Thankfully, there are no "gimmick" actors (such as Keanu Reeves in Much Ado About Nothing.
The center stage, however, belongs to Imogen Stubbs. She is absolutely perfect as Viola. She has a appealing screen presence, and she's way sexy even while she's dressed up as a boy. Men dressing up as women is bizarre, but women dressing up as men is quite erotic. There are many scenes of lustful tension in the film, and Stubbs pulls them off wonderfully!
If you're in the market for Shakespeare on DVD, this one is a must-have. While it's not nearly as funny as Much Ado About Nothing, there are a few amusing scenes. Overall, however, this is much more of a drama than a comedy. The soundtrack is subtle but eloquent. I'm sure that Shakespeare himself gave this one a viewing from somewhere beyond the grave, and I've no doubt he was pleased with the effort!
Movie Review: lively update
Summary: 5 Stars
Though this appears to take place in the 19C, it works extremely well, even with the Elizabethan language. The actors are truly excellent, projecting not just a spirit but an entire environment. We have several versions of this play, including the bbc version and this one is by far the best. You will laugh, you will be moved, you will pity Malvoleo while disliking him, and you will recognize the many poetic phrases that Shakespeare invented for the play and that have entered normal speech. My daughter at 15 loves this play and has it practically memorised, and it even entices her brother (11) to listen and enjoy some of it.
So far as the play goes, I have never quite been able to believe that fraternal twins, a boy and girl, could be mistaken for oneanother, but it is fiction afterall. The story is very fun: twins lost in a ship wreak and washed ashore, are seeking to make their way in an aristocratic society. The girl poses as a man, gaining access to a world of gallant men, to whom she listens and learns, all while a countess is falling for her and not the man she represents. It is wonderfully hilarious gender-bending stuff from another epoch, never over the top or sexual, but always witty and ironic. The countess' drunken uncle and his hapless sidekick are also great fun, particularly when affronted by an affair of honor. The comic situations, as there are apparently two handsome boys, are wonderfully done, believable yet hilarious. Indeed, this is one of the best film versions of Shakespeare I have ever seen.
Warmly recommended.
Movie Review: Twelfth Night video - Imogen Stubbs
Summary: 5 Stars
This production of Twelfth Night is the most substantial one I have seen, with a profound understanding of the characters and their relationships. Ben Kingsley's Feste is a wise man with a powerful intellect and acts as the presiding consciousness of Illyria. Olivia, Viola and Sebastion are all excellent. Sir Andrew emerges as a rather sad but very real personality. Antonio's obsessive love for Sebastian arouses compassion. As a result the comedy is less rousingly slapstick than one sometimes finds, but this makes it possibly for the more subtle comedy of language to come through.
Its setting in Victorian times is completely convincing and provides many comedic details. Sir Andrew with his neck caught under a croquet hoop is a very telling and hilarious example. My only reservation is about Orsino, whose initial appearance with a lip-curling eye-tooth flashing sneer is difficult to forgive or forget - but he improves quite soon.
For use in the literature classroom, this is an excellent choice. It favors substance over surface flash and allows the fundamental themes and relationships to emerge clearly.