À la recherche de Richard

After reading many of the previous reviews and commentaries, I'm beginning to wonder whether we all saw the same movie! I found the entire piece enriching, riveting, and suspenseful, and was immediately moved to call friends and family members to recommend it. The performances are remarkable: Pacino is intense, Ryder catches the "deer-in-the-headlights" feel of her character perfectly. Baldwin is restrained and beguiling, while Spacey delivers his usual flawless performance. Penelope Allen was astounding. The movie serves, not to deliver the entire work-- analyzed, explained, and discussed-- on a platter, but, rather, to whet our appetites and bring Shakespeare to modern classes, and I felt it succeeded in this admirably. It also showed the thought and preparation that goes into such a production. I particularly enjoyed watching the actors discuss various interpretations of particular scenes, imparting their own ideas and feelings, and often disagreeing with each other. While we are both generally "action movie" or suspense fans, we found ourselves completely drawn into the drama, both in the characters and in the actors, and-- even knowing, of course, the ending in advance-- found ourselves on the edge of our seats as the film neared its climax. My one complaint? I wish they had then gone on to film their entire version of Richard III to offer as a companion piece. An excellent way to indulge yourself in an exciting, well-performed piece of movie-making, and actually come away having learned a little bit. Highly recommended!

I saw this movie in English-language version at midnight in April 2004 on a Dutch commercial TV-station. Al Pacino is to be praised for making this movie, of which I have the feeling that it could not be made in these times (are there any indies left?). I was fascinated to see what a gap there is between American and 'European' (i.e. British) ways of tackling the problem of performing a play of Shakespeare: the British interviewees were cool as cucumbers, the American actors (who all do a fine job) were sometimes desperate to find ways of passage through the labyrinth of the play. Pacino used a fine parallel: he made a historic event (the play written by Shakespeare) into a work of art, as did Shakespeare when he turned the rise and fall of the Richard III of the fifteenth century into a play. I think Pacino also tried to do something with one of the most fascinating Shakespearean themes: how life and play (or: men and actors) are intertwined and often cannot be separated. But Pacino could not elaborate on that, probably because he felt that the film otherwise would be too long. Pacino did well in trying to find the most appropriate locations for the scenes. I was mesmerized to see how Richard could do all that he wanted when inside castles and towers, but was at a loss when he found himself in the open fields. Al Pacino, there are still a lot of Shakespeare's plays waiting for you!

Looking for Richard frames the essential postmodern question in its own terms: Is this a film about Richard III, or is this a film about a film about Richard III? Cameras follow Al Pacino as he wanders New York, sometimes on foot, but more often in the back of a limousine. We're not sure what he's doing, except it has something to do with Shakespeare's play Richard III. There are rehearsals with familiar actors, and actual performances, some seemingly on stage, some on sets, some on location, all of it interspersed with discussion about the play. Is the play actually to be staged, or is it all a show for the film? We don't know, and really, it doesn't matter. For the most part, this is a pleasant meditation on its subject.

Pacino has chosen a treacherous path: on one side stands the dauntingly complex Shakespeare play, and on the other the patronizing attempts to simplify it for the modern audience. There were several times when I felt talked down to by the actors, but just as many where I felt I benefited from the expanded explanation. Also, with Pacino so vibrantly at the center of every scene and little attention given to others, the film unavoidably has the flavor of a vanity project.

What the film does convey effectively is the power of theater to transport people intellectually and emotionally. The contrast between Pacino's stuttering attempts to summarize certain plot points and his magnificent animation as Richard is fascinating. Like the story (possibly apocryphal) about how Picasso, when asked to explain the meaning of one of his paintings, replied that if he could do that, he wouldn't need to paint, even inarticulate actors possess remarkable powers when inhabiting their roles. This insight was the film's central revelation for me.

This film has fascinated me ever since I first happened upon it in the library of Millsaps College in Jackson, Mississippi. By a happy coincidence, I also checked out Ian McKellen's quite excellent "Richard III" on the same day and spent most of the afternoon viewing and comparing the two.

It all works: the performances, the interviews, the clowning around on the set. I thought Spacey was wooden, but Baldwin . . . wow . . . who would have expected such a performance.

Highly recommended for anyone who reads and thinks.

Rusty

I love this stuff. But not because it is good -- because it is so bad and the fates have built into the very work a commentary why. And the commentary is by Shakespeare! Wonderful.

Issues

There's a real issue here that is just skirted at the beginning. Should Shakespeare be turned over to actors? Or should someone with a larger vision than mere visceral emotion be in charge and, well. direct, This is a very cogent question with Shakespeare. Clearly, the later plays are not actor's plays but are about ideas. The early plays, like say Romeo and Juliet are clearly actor's plays. They are about people and situations and human motivators. Hamlet is both an early and a later play, as it was rewritten and expanded. Actors alone have a terrible time giving us something whole out of Hamlet.

Richard is a problem too. It is an early play, written while Shakespeare himself was an actor and still learning. Probably, some scenes were written by Marlowe. But it is a huge vision, and one must look at it whole and then abstract the threads that work. You can't build up something that works from immediate emotions and paste it together as Pacino attempts. All this produces are disconnected scenes that don't work together. And that's what we have here.

Another issue. Shakespeare is work. It is work for us all, on both sides of the stage. Earnestness counts for nothing. Pacino's experiment is to get a bunch of non-Shakespearean film folks together. `We won't even work out who has what part.' We watch them stumble about. How revealing, especially when we see snippets from real actors: Redgrave, Branagh, Jacobi, Gielgud. But sigh, no acting from them here.

The real issue: Pacino jumps into his roles with a heaviness that he wears and which pricks and grates. He generates nothing from inside, just spits about. Even if there were some subtle understandings that a group of actors could collaboratively find, it could never occur from this sort of crass in your face mugging.

Richard is a usurper who both charms and forces his way to kingdom. But he doesn't have the internal clockworks to actually connect with his people. Likewise, in this role, Pacino tries to catapult past the basic work -- he forces himself into this role by dint of force without earning it. So he cannot connect with us, his audience.

This is wonderfully educational.