Macbeth

Rating:
Summary: McKellen and Dench are outstanding...
Review: I purchased this tape after it was featured in an interview with Ian McKellen on Inside the Actor's Studio and I decided I had to have it for my collection. This is a very simply staged version of Shakespeare's most violent play, and against this basic black canvas you witness two of the greatest stage actors of all time. The queen knighted both McKellen and Dench after this production, and rightfully so. They are both national treasures, as they should be.

This film is worth watching for these two outstanding performances alone, and for the beauty of the language, unencumbered by complex technical effects. Trevor Nunn has chosen to highlight the emotional deterioration of MacBeth and his Lady for this production, and I wonder if that choice was made because he had these two incredible actors for this production, or if he chose them for this purpose (a variation on the chicken/egg theory of theatrical production).

The "apparitions" (Banquo, dagger, et al) occur in MacBeth's head only -- McKellen's amazing ability convinces you that he sees bloody, murdered Banquo seated at the table, although we do not see him. (Believe me, this is infinitely preferable to some other Banquo apparitions I've witnessed in other productions.) Dench is, quite simply, the best actor alive to ever trod down the even road of the Bard's blank verse. Period. Her Lady MacBeth's degeneration is set in motion from the first letter-reading scene, climaxing in the most jaw-dropping sleepwalking scene ever.

Shakespeare has never SOUNDED better-much of this recording would work equally well as an audio-only version.

Other reviewers have done a remarkable job in explaining what works about this notable production; allow me to share what bothered me about it:

The camera work: looked and felt like an old episode of Dark Shadows with much-too-tight camera angles. I wish that, C-Span-like, the TV director had simply trained a camera on the stage and then we could watch how Nunn utilized the small space of this theatre. So many tight shots of the actors' faces deprive us of seeing what they are doing with the rest of themselves, and how the others in the scene are reacting.

Bob Peck as MacDuff: autistic, rather than artistic. I know the British are famous for their reserve (but the Scots certainly aren't), and sometimes less is more onstage when it comes to emotion, but Peck's greets the news that his wife and children have all been murdered with the same amount of indignation that he might incur at the news that someone drank the last beer in his fridge. It's a choice that doesn't seem to work, and this goes against Shakespeare's own text: ("But I must also feel it as a man"), which makes MacDuff one of the first completely emotional strong, sensitive males on the stage. Even when he murders MacBeth, Peck comes across as only slightly peeved.

Accents: Nunn has chosen to have some of the "character" parts (the Sergeant, the Porter) performed with heavy Scottish brogues-and they are difficult to understand for the average listener. (I'm quite used to these accents and I had a hard time with some of it.) I like the authenticity, but sometimes one should sacrifice authenticity for coherence.

If you like Shakespeare, good acting, or need to learn this play for school, buy this version. It comes closer than most others toward depicting what the main characters are all about, and the language is beautiful and terrifying. If you are studying acting, McKellen and Dench's performances will probably convince you that you have no talent whatsoever.

Rating:
Summary: Could Macbeth get a 5?
Review: Sir Ian McKellen is the best Macbeth I have ever seen; Dame Judy Dench is by far the best Lady Macbeth, and what a regal treat when the best of the best happen to appear in the same play at the same time?
Macbeth is a Shakespearean tale about a tragic flaw in the main characters. How far is man--and woman--willing to go for ambition?
Sir Ian depicts the deconstruction of Macbeth's mind and character probably the way Shakespeare imagined it. Dame Judy is magnificent with the spots--until her own light goes out!
The witches are scary--translated into our modern world--and adding to their power. They are macabre, indeed.
The whole cast is in tune with Macbeth and the task at hand.
For anyone interested in Macbeth and the theater, there is no equal to this production. If you are going to see Macbeth, expose yourself to the best. It will increase your joy and love for the theater and Shakespeare.
If you teach Macbeth, this version will make your job easier and will augment the chances of gaining converts from your young students.

Rating:
Summary: a stellar cast
Review: Staged for a very small theater in 1976, director Trevor Nunn gives us an exceptionally bleak production in shades of black, grey, sepia, and the occasional red of spilled blood...with no sets and minimal props, and lots and lots of mist. The costuming is pared down to a simple "non-descript" look, and overall, it's very effective.

With a fine cast of Royal Shakespeare Company members backing them, Sir Ian and Dame Judi shine brilliantly as the devilish couple. McKellan looks handsome and his disintegration is mesmerizing...his big scene with the witches is fabulous (and terrific witches they are ! Susan Dury, Judith Harte, Marie Kean). Dench is phenomenal! I love the inhuman wail she lets out in the sleepwalking scene. It's chilling, and unforgettable.

There are so many intriguing Macbeth productions available, like the Orson Welles film, and the visually entertaining Polanski/Jon Finch version, but this "bare bones" one is my favorite, where the play's the thing.

Rating:
Summary: Sanity Erupted
Review: This version of Macbeth, which is a triumph I must add, made me very pleased to watch it. And although there is no real set, but a circle surrounded by rocks, this film was very emotional. It does not use much gore in it to show that it is a horror film. This version of Macbeth shows Ian McKellen, the man who portrayed Gandalkf in The Lord of The Rings, at his best in this shakespearian work. It does not even show Macbeth's head at the end, yet this work has all of the wit, horror, and cleverness to be declared a shakespearian treasure.

Rating:
Summary: The Potential of Shakespeare Realized
Review: Without question, this version of Macbeth featuring two of the finest actors to speak dialogue is one of the most compelling, chillingly stark renderings of the bard's bloody drama ever captured on film. An actual staged production, the Trevor Nunn film posits the Macbeth world in a land of black shadows broken occasionally by the luminescent faces of the poor souls who populate that world. The characters come from darkness and they return there. In envisioning the play this way, Nunn emphasizes the sad vulnerability of human beings who must act out their little roles only to vanish in the great swallowing mystery of time and eternity.

Ian McKellan's Macbeth is one of those tortured souls: a real human being riddled with arrogance and aspirations but at the same time tormented by morality and fear. McKellan's performance is not of a monster but of a human being teetering on the brink of good and evil. Once he loses his delicate balance, McKellan's Macbeth becomes cold and statuary, a soul realizing its own destruction, its own sinking into the great gulf of blood it has spilled. McKellan manages to capture Shakespeare's vision of a Macbeth who is always self-aware, always conscious of his own evil and its consequences.

Judi Dench's Lady Macbeth makes a similar transformation, except in her journey, she moves from cold, malevolent she-devil to sadly broken, guilt-ridden madwoman. Dench's performance is the show's dramatic star, its center, its barometer for guilt and its exacting consequences. The sleep walking scene is one of the finest depictions of guilt and human culpability one is likely ever to see performed and reason enough to award this production five stars.

Both McKellan and Dench humanize their characters, never letting them slip into the extremes of monsterdom. Both Macbeth and Lady Macbeth appear here as our brother and sister: equipped with minds and souls capable of knowing good but also capable of choosing evil, or perhaps capable of letting evil choose them. Their relentless self-awareness is the one quality of Shakespeare's play that makes it so chilling: great figures losing their better selves and having their eyes open during the loss. To commit evil and know it--such is the awful plight of these hapless souls--and Nunn's production, buoyed by remarkable performances, renders that plight disturbingly our own.