RICHARD III (1956)
A film review by Steve Rhodes
Copyright 1996 Steve Rhodes
RATING (0 TO ****): ***
As I reported recently, Hollywood is on a Shakespeare tear. The studios just released three Shakespearean films and have more about to be unveiled. To compliment this, my all time favorite art house theater chain, the Camera Cinemas in San Jose, is having a Shakespeare festival where they are reviving some of the old and not so Shakespearean movies.
This week I got to see for the first time the Laurence Olivier classic RICHARD III from 1956. This is one of three Shakespearean films where Olivier was both director and star. The other two are HENRY V (1944) and HAMLET (1948). He got Academy Award nominations for the acting in all three of them. In HAMLET he actually won the award as well as garnered a nomination for best director.
When I saw the film, the theater was rather full. The people ranged from students who hadn't a clue as to why their teacher sent them to teachers to film buffs. Since the sign on the door incorrectly said LOOKING FOR RICHARD, perhaps there were even a few people there wondering when Al Pacino would show up on screen.
The audience's reaction was fascinating. The teenagers saw the costumes and the exaggerated acting style and laughed frequently at the film. To them the movie was a parody. Otto Heller's old saturated Technicolor print and Roger K. Furse's Disneyland style sets combined to look like the WIZARD OF OZ. Actually, it visually reminded me of THE 5,000 FINGERS OF DR. T. (1953). Moreover, Olivier's elaborate costumes, bad hairdo, and fake nose kept me thinking how much Olivier looked liked Hans Conried playing Dr. Terwilliker. Most of the rest of the audience seemed to have my reaction, an interesting film, but not quite what I had expected. It certainly does not possess the seriousness of his HENRY V.
The film opens with a hokey score by William Walton. Like most of the film, although it seems so dated today, it probably seemed fresh and stirring in its time. As the music plays, the audience reads the story's long background from a gilded scroll that moves by in front of them.
The sets have a fairy tale quality, and the whole movie, with the exception of the ending, has the claustrophobic feeling of a filmed play. Today's Shakespearean interpreters, especially Branagh and Zeffirelli, open up the plays much more when they bring them to the screen. In Olivier's days, most of the movies were filmed in the controlled environments of the studios' sound stages.
Another difference is in the way Shakespeare's text is adapted. Most modern screenwriters, most especially Baz Luhrmann with his screenplay this year for ROMEO AND JULIET, truncate long monologues. Ian McKellen's RICHARD III (1995), for example, had the famous "Now is the winter of our discontent made glorious summer" speech abbreviated and happening in a crowded ballroom. Alan Dent and Laurence Olivier's script for this Richard III edit only slightly the long monologues and have them delivered in sparsely furnished rooms so that the viewer has few distractions.
Here I must be honest, as much as I admired Olivier's RICHARD III, I found McKellen's more involving. Olivier's film is interesting and certainly the acting is excellent, but I had trouble getting over how dated it all seemed. Don't get me wrong, I do like old movies and think Olivier's HENRY V is brilliant.
"Conscience is but a word that cowards use," says Richard before the big ending battle at Bosworth Field. It is at this point that the movie really came alive for me. I particularly liked Stanley Baker as the Earl of Richmond, who later became King Henry VII. He looked like a cross between a Greek god and Lohengrin.
When the filming goes outdoors, in Spain, the colors change from being over saturated to being washed out. One never knows of course what the original prints looked like.
Olivier's RICHARD III is less serious and more colorful than I had expected, but it is a film well worth seeing.
I do not feel I can close without listing some of the many members of the cast. They include: Claire Bloom as Lady Anne Neville, Alec Clunes as Lord Hastings, John Gielgud as Duke of Clarence, Cedric Hardwicke as King Edward IV, Helen Haye as Duchess of York, Laurence Naismith as Lord Stanley, John Phillips as Duke of Norfolk, Ralph Richardson as Duke of Buckingham, and Patrick Troughton as James Tyrell.
RICHARD III ran 2:19 in the version I saw, but some footage has been lost over the years. Originally it ran about 2:40. The film is not rated but would get a G today. There is no sex, nudity, or bad language. The little violence is cartoonish, but there is a little blood. The film would be fine for a child of any age, but young children can only appreciate the visuals since the language is way too obscure for them. I recommend the film to you and give it ***.
**** = One of the top few films of this or any year. A must see film. *** = Excellent show. Look for it. ** = Average movie. Kind of enjoyable. * = Poor show. Don't waste your money. 0 = One of the worst films of this or any year. Totally unbearable.
REVIEW WRITTEN ON: November 4, 1996
Opinions expressed are mine and not meant to reflect my employer's.
The review above was posted to the
rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup (de.rec.film.kritiken for German reviews).
The Internet Movie Database accepts no responsibility for the contents of the
review and has no editorial control. Unless stated otherwise, the copyright
belongs to the author.
Please direct comments/criticisms of the review to relevant newsgroups.
Broken URLs inthe reviews are the responsibility of the author.
The formatting of the review is likely to differ from the original due
to ASCII to HTML conversion.
Related links: index of all rec.arts.movies.reviews reviews