Dir. Tom Stoppard

Starring Gary Oldman, Tim Roth, Richard Dreyfuss

Shakespeare can be a lot of things. Boring, stilted, vague, pompous. It can also be lots of good things in the hands of the right people. Tom Stoppard is one such person, which he proved to a general audience with his Shakespeare in Love, earning him an Oscar for best screenplay.

While that movie showed a glimpse into the authors possible surrounding affairs, Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead take us behind the curtains of a play, as if it were real life. It shows us the lives and thoughts of two minor characters in Hamlet, as they struggle to find out what’s actually going on. Oh, and which of them is actually Rosencrantz and who is Guildenstern.

This is one of those movies where you can honestly say “you have to see it for yourself to get it”. The catch is that if you do get it, it is probably not what your friend got. Which is OK. That’s one of the many slightly pointy bits of this movie. Existential drivel has never been so entertaining, or well written, and if you’re not too sleepy you’ll be swept off with it. Do not, however, watch this if you’re ready for bed. I didn’t count the minutes, but there are parts with nothing much happening at all. I suppose it’s paced to give you time to think about what’s happening, much like the characters.

It’s at the very least a conversation piece, but hopefully more if you enjoy a different perspective of a known subject. Even if you’re “not that into Shakespeare”.

Keywords: Shakespeare, Quirky

Dir. Tom Stoppard

Gary Oldman, Tim Roth, Richard Dreyfuss etc.,

If you think the title of this movie is a bit of a mouthful, so is the movie… it’s full of quips and puns that twist and turn and keep you on your toes.

Rarely do I watch a movie where I feel a bit like an uncultured person because obviously this probably would have been easier to follow if I knew Shakespeare’s plays and more about the characters such as Hamlet and Ophelia. I’m not sure what it says about me that I recognized her more because of a simple shot of her, drowned, underwater…. as she had been painted by famous artists, than for her role in one of his plays.

The writing is smart and kept making me smirk and smile at how easily the English language can be turned on it’s head by a writer who contorts sentences like the most flexible acrobat.

This movie was smart and funny (even though I didn’t understand it all ) I really did enjoy when Rosencrantz (hmm…. or was it Guildenstern ) was always on the verge of some major scientific discovery and I even liked the play within a play of the tragedians acting out a swordfight sans epée and with red cloth as blood. I was as immersed in that scene as I would have been if there were actual swords and real blood. The acting was superb.

I did feel a little lost because I couldn’t figure out where the movie was actually supposed to be taking me and kept asking myself the same question that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern ask: “What’s it all about” and I guess, that’s exactly the point.

Keywords: Shakespeare, Quirky