I'm so tired of seeing the trailer for this movie, and I long for the ol Mickey Rooney 1935 version which also starred James Cagney and Dick Powell (along with Olivia De Havilland and others). I'll see this version, but the trailer has my hopes down quite a bit. And this review is a bit depressing, but then... maybe he missed the tone of the film... We'll see soon enough
With all the big special effects movies about to explode, I don't know how many fans of this site are gonna care about this one, but....just got back from an advance screening of the latest film version of Shakespeare's classic comedy "A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM". I guess somebody forgot to tell director Michael Hoffman that IT'S A FRIGGING COMEDY!!!!
Boy, did I have big hopes for this, especially after going nutty batshit over "SHAKESPEARE IN LOVE", which proved that it IS possible to make Shakespeare fun and accessible, not stodgy and pretentious and boring. Which is what "AMSND" is. I've seen college theater productions that had more life than this bland stinker.
If you post this, I'm assuming any interested in reading this will be familiar enough with the plot that I don't have to rehash it here. But for those who aren't, there sure as hell ain't no prologue that tells about the advent of the BICYCLE in the Italian town of Athens. All this does is provide set up for the film's main running prop, the bike. And it kills kills kills so much fo the potential for comedy. Young lovers are supposed to be running back and forth through the woods, hot on each other's tails -- not wobbling unsteadily through rocky terrain trying to make their marks and recite dialogue at the same time. The bike shit kills the comic urgency. But this ties into one of the movie's biggest problems: too much attention to art direction and not enough to performances. Far too many shots of lush scenery and satyrs and sumptuous wedding preparations -- with little attention to making brilliantly written scenes work.
The actors just ain't directed well at all. Calista Flockhart - miscast as Helena. Like everyone in the cast, too damn earnest and not funny at all (and of the 4 young lovers, she's the best part). And in my mind, too damn pretty for Helena. Anna Friel does well as Hermia, but she's the same height as Calista! So what, you ask? Well, there's a whole catfight in the middle in which they trade barbs about Helena being a beanpole and Hermia a shrimp -- which completely doesn't work! This scene should be the highpoint of the farcical complications, but it literally winds up in the mud (the two actresses wind up flopping around in the mud). The male lovers are blah, especially Christian Bale. Michelle Pfeiffer as Fairy Queen Titania is ever the eyeful, but again, director Hoffman gives her NADA to do. She recites an acting class monologue straight to the camera. Yawn.... All the fairy scenes are too pretty and affected and leaden. Worst of all is Rupert Everett as Oberon, King of the Fairies. First of all, what is this big ol' gay-man actor doing playing lover opposite to La Pfeiffer?? Okay, yes, he is playing King of the Fairies, but he's supposed to be hot for Titania. There is absolutely no chemistry between them whatsoever, and their scenes should crackle with sexual tension. Everett SLEEPWALKS through this with a hangdog look instead of driving the pacing and energy of the middle sequences in the forest, which he should. And much as I love Stanley Tucci, I'm sorry -- too flat too old too deadpan too unspritely. His character, Puck, should be impish, not dryly ironic. Best of all the leads is Kevin Kline as the hambone actor, Bottom, especially in the disastrous play-within-a-play (the only funny part of the film). But didn't anyone read Shakespeare's stage directions? When he's transformed by Puck, Bottom's supposed to look like a DONKEY not a RABBIT!! With all the cool animatronics & special effects, they coulda put a real donkey head on him and blew the audience's (and the character's) minds. Instead, it looks like they ran out of money for makeup and threw some bunny ears on him. And unfortunately, Kline's scenes with Pfeiffer are flat flat flat. WHERE'S THE FUNNY???? There are some good performances, particularly from Bill Irwin and David Straitharn -- but their parts are supposed to be peripheral. Man, you're in trouble if the most memorable roles in your Midsummer are Theseus and the dude playing The Wall.
And speaking of the lame makeup effect, finally movies have the technology to have fun with effects for magic. But all the fairy stuff is weak and cheezy. Yeah, I know, it's Fox's arthouse division, and they ain't gonna pump millions in CGI shots into this. But still....
Fox Searchlight is obviously counterprogramming this to all the adults who could give a crap about "THE PHANTOM MENACE". But it's a good thing they're releasing both films, cuz "TPM" will easily cover the red ink that this movie's gonna spill. Oh sure, English teachers will get the video for high school classes down the line -- but it'll only put off those folks dreading Shakespeare and proving them right. Man, did they miss the boat on this one.
-- Mr. Bundini
