Cheap William Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice (DVD) (Al Pacino, Jeremy Irons, Joseph Fiennes, Lynn Collins) (Michael Radford) Price

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Customer Reviews of William Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice

As powerful and relevant now as t'was 500 years ago
I'm always a bit surprised how many people still approach screen adaptations of Shakespeare's work as though it should a completely faithful representation of the original stagework. Obviously, Shakespeare was writing for a different audience under different circumstances - that his stories resonate still so strongly - and are the stuff of dreams for actors of every era is credit to his genius. That we can have a director who finds the true relevance - and can prune the 3+ hour script to fit a modernistic vision without destroying the heart of Shakespeare's original makes this a happy time for those of us who love the Bard however we can get him. <
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>I have to disagree with one of Amazon's top reviewers here who complained that the "pound of flesh" scene was rendered too realistically. The situation that Shakespeare filtered through director Michael Radford's own particular genius, has created here is one of such riveting drama, I found my cheeks stained with tears at the horrors that cruelty, corruption, racism and the extraction of revenge can wreak on a so-called "civilized society." Pacino's encapsulation of Shylock's defeat is all the more tragic and utterly pitiable because of the limits he was ready to blindly exceed in the name of "justice." <
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>Pacino along with Jeremy Irons, Joseph Fiennes, Lynn Collins, Zuleikha Robinson, Heather Goldenhersh, and Kris Marshall head an international cast that seemed to be of one mind with Michael Radford's project and present an ensemble that (pardon the pun) cuts right to the meat of the matters at hand. <
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>Visually, this is about as opulent and naturalistic as film can get. Combined with a score mixed of 16th century feeling modern film music and some <
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>Shakespeare's half millennia old play still resonates on issues of racism, social distinction, love, loyalty and the power of friendship. This film should not be missed. <
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Quite Disappointed
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>This film seemed to have everything going for it, i.e., great actors, beautiful sets, fine music, not to mention the Bard himself as screenwriter. Unfortunately, it fell quite flat for me. <
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>Al Pacino showed such great talent for Shakespeare in "Looking for Richard" that I hardly thought that his Shylock would be as awkward as it was. Pacino did not seem to know exactly how to play the part and this is evidenced in how he seemed to stumble through Shylock's various guises. It must be said that he is not entirely to blame. The opening of the film gives a brief historical account of the status of Jews in 16th century Venetia. This is followed upon by an added scene where Shylock is harrassed and spat upon by Bassanio. This introduction immediately encourages us to take an initially sympathic attitude towards the part of a comic villain. More important than Venetian anti-Semitism, I believe, is the understanding that when Shakespeare wrote the Merchant, Jews had been expelled from England for over 300 years. A Shylock-type character would have been a completely foreign personality to the average London playgoer at the time as well as to Shakespeare. Compared to 16th century Jewish stereotypes (contrast Marlowe's Barabas), Shakespeare's treatment seemed to be more aggravated towards the "miserly" Shylock as opposed to the "Jewish" Shylock. <
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>That said, it still remains a very difficult character to present to modern audiences without many feeling uncomfortable. Both Pacino and the director did a great deal towards garnering our sympathies towards Shylock. Through most of the film, perhaps just up to the discussion of Shylock's and Tubal's regarding the missing Jessica, Shylock evokes great pity. For instance, I had never seen such the loss of a child in cinema expressed with such heart-rending cries as Pacino does when he discovers that his daughter Jessica has eloped. But amidst this deep pity we feel, we are introduced to the other characters of the play who seem almost hateful in reaction. Bassanio is shown an cruel anti-Semite (before the actual play even gets started), causing me to dislike the character who otherwise would have evoked sympathy himself. Antonio never seems anything better than excessively greedy and his romance of Portia is never removed of its monetary overtones as it so easily is in other stage productions. Portia, however, seems to remain stellar and humerous though one can't help wonder, even after the film ends, what she ever saw in Antonio (I think she would have been just has happy with Morocco). <
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>Much of the film could have avoided trouble by simply leaving our pity for Shylock to be gained at the end of play, yet by asking for it at the beginning, it left me feeling rather strange to see him hungering so viciously after Bassanio's heart. By the end of the film, I wasn't sure what to feel about any of the players. Shylock is played as either pitious or villainous, and though either trait can exhibit subtleties of the other, it's impossible to be both at the same time. <
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>This is not to say that the movie does have redeeming qualities, and I would certainly not say that it should not be seen. Lynn Collins (Portia) is as beautiful as to role requires and as gracious. The scenery and sets are marvelous and the ambient music is done very nicely. The scenes with Morocco and especially Aragon are outrageously funny and courtroom scene towards the end of the film is delightfully intense. <
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>Enjoy the film but keep in mind that the roles can be played differently and better, as with the Olivier production, and that a great deal of lines have been cut.

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Shylack
As an actor, Al Pacino comprehends a fairly narrow subset of humanity: thugs, mobsters, hustlers, operators, and anyone conversant with the modern American street. He has little or no affinity for patricians, intellectuals, the cultivated, the well-spoken, or people from other times and other countries. This makes him a disastrous Shakespearean, as his Richard III so wincingly confirmed. Shylock might seem more promising, a resident of the ghetto with an earthier argot; and didn't Dusty do it not so long ago? But the 400 year-old idiom and a welter of other strangenesses stand between Pacino and the character, and he cannot connect with his role. He accordingly does what any actor in his situation would do. He withdraws into himself and gives a shy, subdued performance, hoping that muted incompetence will pass for restraint. <
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>Pacino spends much of the film in a state of apparent exhaustion, trudging from scene to scene with his eyelids half open. His voice never rises above a gravelly murmur. With Jessica he shows neither sternness nor tenderness, only somnolence. His initial scene is impenetrable: why does this notorious usurer forgo interest in favor of a pound of worthless flesh? To appease the Christians with a "merry bond"? Or to tickle his vindictiveness with the mere possibility of killing Antonio? The first choice can work only if you cut Shylock's vow to catch Antonio "upon the hip" and "feed the ancient grudge" he bears him--a cut which this politically correct film predictably makes. The second choice is the one Shakespeare intended. Yet remarkably, Pacino plays neither, his droopy-eyed fatigue conveying neither hatred nor hope for acceptance. At times he comes fleetingly to half-life, only to relapse into insomniac depletion. "Hath not a Jew eyes?" is gruff rather than furious or anguished; he is offhand rather than impassioned in the jailer scene; and his demeanor at the trial is moody. We must assume that Shylock is motivated throughout by nothing more than weary resignation. <
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>Some reviewers have dubbed Pacino an accomplished verse-speaker, surpassing the seasoned British actors with whom he shares the screen. Since he has played only two other Shakespearean roles in a 40-year career overwhelmingly skewed towards contemporary semi-literates, this would be amazing if true. In fact, Pacino speaks terribly, his discomfort with the language manifest in his abashed muttering, and in a hesitant, halting, word-by-word delivery maintained from beginning to end. Could this be dialectal, the alien Jew negotiating a foreign tongue? No, because Pacino uses the same plodding diction with Jessica and Tubal. (Ignorance has a hard time masquerading as characterization). Phony Britishness causes him to pronounce "lord" as "lohrd"; when mingled with the strains of his native Bronx, it changes terminal-"r" words into ear-sores or rather ee-ah-saws. His mumbling articulation can have a truncating effect, as when "tourquoise" is lopped into "tourquoi" and "better the instruction" into "bet the instruction." A foreign language is indeed being negotiated, but it's Pacino stumbling through Shakespeare. <
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>Hollywood stars rarely distinguish themselves when they tackle the Bard, and Al Pacino is no exception. Though lauded by some as a major achievement, his whispery, tentative and amateurish Shylock is a monument to nothing but his own inexperience.