Love's Labours Lost [VHS]
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VHS Movie Reviews of Love's Labours Lost [VHS]
Movie Review: no, shakespeare never wrote a musical
Summary: 3 Stars
this is a loose musical adaptation of the non-musical shakespeare play. it misses the point of the play which was about the absurdity of too much bookish learning and the attendant abuses of the english language. but considering the difficulty of the play's language, substituting songs for words is probably the only way to make lll accessible to middlebrow audiences. what branagh does retain is the lighthearted spirit of the play. i prefer the original, and, if you can, watch the bbc tv shakespeare version of 'love's labour's lost'. it's one of my faves.3 1/2 stars for this unusual adaptation
Movie Review: Fred Astaire Meets Shakespeare
Summary: 2 Stars
Normally I am a big fan of Kenneth Branaugh, but this just had too much singing and dancing and not enough substance. Everytime it seems that a character got a little bit heartbroken or needed to let off some "girl" or "boy" trouble steam, they suddenly turned into Fred Astaire or Ginger Rogers. The part where the men were flying in the air singing about love was almost too much for me to stomach. I do credit Martin Scorsese for taking a relatively experimental step with Shakespeare and making it into a jazzy 30s style movie. Many directors would not take such a chance. This is a movie that is more about fun than taking itself too seriously, and if you are the type that enjoys a good musical, this might be a fun movie to take in.
I just felt it was too much musical and not enough dialogue, and by the end, I really didn't care about any of the characters.
Movie Review: Fred Astaire Meets Shakespeare
Summary: 2 Stars
Normally I am a big fan of Kenneth Branaugh, but this just had too much singing and dancing and not enough substance. Everytime it seems that a character got a little bit heartbroken or needed to let off some "girl" or "boy" trouble steam, they suddenly turned into Fred Astaire or Ginger Rogers. The part where the men were flying in the air singing about love was almost too much for me to stomach. I do credit Martin Scorsese for taking a relatively experimental step with Shakespeare and making it into a jazzy 30s style movie. Many directors would not take such a chance. This is a movie that is more about fun than taking itself too seriously, and if you are the type that enjoys a good musical, this might be a fun movie to take in.
I just felt it was too much musical and not enough dialogue, and by the end, I really didn't care about any of the characters.
Movie Review: Watch Brannagh's Much Ado or Fred and Ginger, Instead
Summary: 3 Stars
Kenneth Brannagh started out as the modern wunderkind of Shakespearean cinema. His early films, Henry V and Much Ado About Nothing, are both brilliant, despite some odd casting choices in the latter (Keanu Reeves). And while I wasn't wild about his uncut, four-hour version of Hamlet, he definitely deserves credit for having the guts to film the whole thing. So, while I was deeply skeptical about his approach to Love's Labour's Lost, I decided to give it a chance anyway.In some ways, it worked. It had entertaining moments, the songs were adequately executed, and the cast was more or less up to the task before them. It is a perfectly acceptable way to spend a otherwise unoccupied afternoon. But having watched it, I will probably never do so again.
Brannagh is both helped and hindered in this production by having chosen one of Shakespeare's lesser known plays. The radical liberties he takes with the text (and the insertion of all those songs!) are more likely to be forgiven (or even really noticed) with this than, say, A Midsummer Night's Dream. That also allows him to get away with the tidying of Shakespeare's rather open-ended non-ending.
But there's a reason Love's Labour's Lost is one of the lesser known plays -- namely, Shakespeare wrote much better ones. Nothing exists in this play (or in the movie version) that isn't done better somewhere else. If you want a Shakespearean comedy, try Twelfth Night, Much Ado About Nothing, or a Midsummer Night's Dream. (There are excellent movie versions of each. Better yet, see one live.) If you want to see a thirties musical, try one of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rodger's classics. And if you have seen Brannagh's Benedick (in Much Ado), you have pretty much seen his Berowne, and in a better movie with a better cast.
Movie Review: Definitely labored and definitely lost.
Summary: 1 Stars
Of all the adaptations of Shakespeare's plays for the screen, this is among the very worst. After Branagh's glorious Much Ado About Nothing, one might expect a similar treatment for this comedy. Unfortunately, this was not so. Why bother making a musical with actors and actresses who can neither sing nor dance? Maybe this could be forgiven if the acting weren't, at best, merely adequate.