Wonderful character development!

This is How Movies Should Be Made

Overrated

Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

Although some of Shakespeare's plays have made a nice transition onto film, or at least, lightly entertaining, despite three film versions, As You Like It hasn't fared well on screen. Perhaps this is because of the play's nature. It's very theatrical, being mainly talk and interaction between the characters.Of all the plays to adapt in a modern setting (Julius Caesar is the eternal story of backstabbing politicians), As You Like It does not seem the obvious choice. It is quaint and pastoral and hardly strikes an audience as being particularly socially relevant to our times. But bizarrely the director Christine Edzard sees some sort of pressing modern relevance, though nobody else seems to find this.The court has now turned into the foyer of a posh bank with mock classical features inside. You can see how it might have looked like a good substitute for a court but it feels a little too forced to be entirely convincing.Orlando is a sulky youth in a hoodie; Oliver is a smarmy yuppie. Both are played by Andrew Tiernan, which is initially an interesting conceit but it soon becomes a little ridiculous, particularly in the wedding scene. Tiernan is average as both.Rosalind's cousin Celia (Celia Bannerman) is old enough to be her mother. It's just about acceptable until Celia has a chat with her father the Duke, where it is too incredible to believe that Celia could be his daughter.So, how do you make a forest modern? You don't- you ditch the pastoral setting and use a London wasteland! In fairness, the wasteland works quite well and you get used to it, almost attached to it. It's your modern day wilderness. Jaques (James Fox) is a posh man slumming it with the homeless. Instead of being a hippie as it looks like in Branagh's film, here Jaques is a wandering soul, a loner. There is a certain sadness and mystery to him and Fox brings this out well. However for some strange reason his Seven Ages of Man speech is used as a prologue and repeated at the point it comes in the play.Ewen Bremner is suitably pathetic as Silvius and Valerie Gogan is very good as Phoebe. Miriam Margoyles doesn't have much to do as Audrey but she does a good job but Griff Rhys Jones is incomprehensible as Touchstone. You cannot hear a word he's saying.Emma Croft is brilliant as Rosalind. She makes a convincing transition into a young teenage boy (hoodie, baggy jeans and a hat instead of doublet and hose) unlike Bryce Dallas Howard in the 2006 film who in no way plays at being a man. Her love for Orlando is believable and she is easy to root for.The pace of the film is incredibly slow. The beginning drags out- you might as well fast forward the action until you get to the forest. The wrestling is not shown- instead we get mild audience reaction which looks as if they're watching a man sorting out the plumbing than a life or death wrestle.The film is a failed experiment. The modern setting doesn't help an audience understand the play, although it makes Rosalind's disguise easier and it is interesting. Most people would struggle to identify this as As You Like It, were it not for the names. One major disadvantage of modern adaptations of Shakespeare is that they can date quickly. This film is incredibly dated, despite it being made less than twenty years ago. The 1990's aren't seen as a historical period so one can't really call it 'Shakespeare for the nineties'.Basically, the blame lies with the director. Not only is the concept flawed but the staging is often bad, the text distorted, and all the actors looked as if they have been trapped. Edzard tries to find a serious message in As You Like It that isn't there and so the whole thing is often depressing.

This is a rather frustrating film, with occasional patches of brilliance lost in a generally dull and inept staging. It's an attempt at making a modern-dress film of Shakespeare's play. The Court of France becomes a flashy office block in London, and the Forest of Arden becomes the banks of the dirty river Thames. The pastoral shepherds become homeless people. Purists may shriek, but this is actually rather clever, since Shakespeare's Arden is not meant to be a jolly happy place; it's meant to be a place where the attempt to live a simple life is complicated by the fact that the winter winds are freezing cold, and that poor people can be just as miserable as kings.There are some good performances, especially Andrew Tiernan, who doubles Oliver and Orlando, and Edward Fox, who plays Jaques as a drily witty public-school toff, slumming it with the homeless. Occasionally the new setting works really well, such as when Orlando is slouching in the foyer of the 'court', and when the girls are seen trailing across an industrial wasteland, carrying their belongings in Harrods shopping bags. And I liked seeing Audrey as the owner of a caravan-cafe, and her tomato ketchup sandwiches are funny.But there are some awful moments too. Griff Rhys Jones' Touchstone must be the least amusing performance in the history of film. The wrestling match happens, but is not shown on camera (we only see the audience's response), presumably because they couldn't think of a modern equivalent but didn't want to cut the scene. Worst of all is the dire folk music soundtrack, which belongs in a 'traditional' film of the play rather than a modern interpretation. For most of its duration, the film is slow, awkward and ultimately foolish.I would like to be supportive of this film. It certainly should be viewed by anyone interested in the play. Although its faults outweigh its merits, there are moments that will illuminate your understanding of the play, and it's good that there are filmmakers who want to present Shakespeare in a controversial way. Christine Edzard is the precursor to Julie Taymor's 'Titus', and Baz Luhrmann's 'Romeo and Juliet'. And for that we should be grateful.