All is True (2018)
It’s fairly obvious, but I’ll say it anyway: this movie is only for fans of Shakespeare. If you don’t love him so much you want to step back in time and try to get to know him, his family, and his pain, you’re not going to like it. A girl who watched the movie with me was not well-versed in Shakespeare. Much of his prose is recited in the film, and when “the stuff that dreams are made of” was rattled off, she turned to me and said, “That’s Shakespeare? I thought it was Humphrey Bogart!” If you know The Maltese Falcon better than you know The Tempest, you’ll probably be bored to tears. There are many long pauses between lines, long shots that show more of the scenery than the actors’ faces, and scenes that are lit only by a fireplace.
The same ignorant viewer who was my viewing companion asked after half an hour, “Who’s playing Shakespeare, anyway?” So, we’ll just take her opinion with a grain of salt. But who else could (or would) play him than Kenneth Branagh? He’s nearly unrecognizable, though, with a full skull cap that reaches below his false eyebrows, a prosthetic nose, and a stick-on beard. Judi Dench plays his wife, and she looks very young and feminine, reminding me of Katharine Hepburn.
My main criticism of the movie is fairly obvious, but others probably won’t share it. No one really knows the innerworkings of Shakespeare’s life, and while millions of people long to find out, the meat of this movie is complete fiction. Yes, there are truths in it, like the names and marriage records of his children, but the arguments and terrible secrets within the family are mere imaginings. That being said, if you want to imagine that Shakespeare lived through awful pain towards the end of his life, go ahead and rent it. The Bard himself won’t be taken down off his pedestal; Kenneth Branagh portrays him as an extremely loving and forgiving man.
More Judi Dench movies here!
The same ignorant viewer who was my viewing companion asked after half an hour, “Who’s playing Shakespeare, anyway?” So, we’ll just take her opinion with a grain of salt. But who else could (or would) play him than Kenneth Branagh? He’s nearly unrecognizable, though, with a full skull cap that reaches below his false eyebrows, a prosthetic nose, and a stick-on beard. Judi Dench plays his wife, and she looks very young and feminine, reminding me of Katharine Hepburn.
My main criticism of the movie is fairly obvious, but others probably won’t share it. No one really knows the innerworkings of Shakespeare’s life, and while millions of people long to find out, the meat of this movie is complete fiction. Yes, there are truths in it, like the names and marriage records of his children, but the arguments and terrible secrets within the family are mere imaginings. That being said, if you want to imagine that Shakespeare lived through awful pain towards the end of his life, go ahead and rent it. The Bard himself won’t be taken down off his pedestal; Kenneth Branagh portrays him as an extremely loving and forgiving man.
More Judi Dench movies here!