The Movie: The Tragedy of Macbeth
The Director: Joel Coen
The Cast: Denzel Washington, Frances McDormand, Bertie Carvel, Alex Hassell, Corey Hawkins, Harry Melling, Brendan Gleeson, Kathryn Hunter
The Story: A tale of murder, madness, ambition, and wrathful cunning.
The Review:
Going into this movie, I had never watched the play that it is based on and really knew nothing about it other than it was written by the one and only William Shakespeare. Maybe it would have been better if I had some sort of reference or connection because this movie did absolutely nothing for me in any way. I understand Joel Coen is a great director and the cast is top of the line but that doesn't automatically qualify the movie for greatness. You still have to entertain me and this wasn't it.
I do understand that not every movie is for every person and we all have our own tastes and we all have different things that we look for in out entertainment and I know a lot of people think highly of this movie for their own reasons. That's the main reason why I don't label anything as best or worst, rather I go with favorites or ones I enjoyed the most. Technically this movie looks clean and well polished and has a very specific look that fits the material very well although I'm not a fan of the 1.33 : 1 aspect ratio but again that's just me.
The performances seemed appropriately dramatic and very Shakespearian as it were but the dialog was kind of annoying to me. For some reason it just didn't feel right like I kept seeing the actors as they are in present day trying to play these parts rather than allowing my imagination to immerse them into the time and place they were playing in. Not sure if that's my own doing or the movie's inability to get me there but whatever it was, it didn't work for me.
The Verdict:
The Tragedy of Macbeth is a tragedy in filmmaking that didn't hit any note correctly for me. It came off more like a small scale theater production that just happened to have big name stars attached to it and maybe that's intentional but nope. No thanks, I'll take a pass on this one.
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