My Top Ten Favorite Shakespeare Movies

Happy Shakespeare's birthday everyone. In honor of the Bard, I'm writing up a list of my top ten movies adapted from his plays. I'm going to be very loose about that term, and throw in a title or two that aren't direct adaptations, but heavily influenced by his work. And to keep things interesting, I'm limiting myself to only picking one movie per play.

Romeo + Juliet (1996) - Let's get this out of the way first. Yes, I really enjoy Baz Luhrmann's modern-day take on "Romeo and Juliet," and it's my favorite of the film adaptations by far. There are some famously iffy choices, but I just love the MTV imagery and the cast - Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes as our young lovers, Pete Postlethwait as the priest, John Leguizamo as Tybalt Prince of Cats, and Harold Perrineau as Mercutio.

Titus (1999) - Julie Taymor's blood-soaked version of "Titus Andronicus" with Anthony Hopkins and Jessica Lange is similarly a flawed piece of work, but good grief, the creative staging and the symbolism-heavy visuals make it a hard one to forget. You never saw a more raw and venal approach to Shakespeare, where all the major players are really terrible, bloodthirsty people. The highlight of the film for me is Harry Lennix as the fascinating manipulator, Aaron.

The Taming of the Shrew (1967) - Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton are one of the most famous screen couples of all time. Franco Zeffirelli's "The Taming of the Shrew" is a wonderful example of their best work together. Burton is charming and robust, while Taylor is a joyfully over-the-top harridan. Around their performances, Zeffirelli builds a film that is wonderfully funny and effervescent and a little bit bawdy in all the right places.

Throne of Blood (1957) - There have been many adaptations of Shakespeare's "Macbeth," but nothing quite like what Akira Kurosawa and his favorite leading man, Toshiro Mifune managed to achieve with "Throne of Blood." The action is moved to feudal Japan, the kings and knights replaced with daimyo and samurai. And then there's the substitute method of execution, which leads to one of the greatest cinematic death scenes of all time.

Hamlet (1996) - I really love the 1948 version with Laurence Olivier, but how can you say no to Kenneth Branagh's version? It's the full play done over four hours on a grandiose set, populated by a star-studded cast of actors. (Billy Crystal as the Gravedigger!) Ironically it's Branagh himself as Hamlet who I find the least convincing, but everything else in the picture more than makes up for it. He's much better as Henry V, but "Hamlet" is definitely his best film.

Shakespeare in Love (1998) - I'm going to count this one for "Twelfth Night," because though the characters are performing "Romeo and Juliet," the events that transpire are what give Shakespeare the plot for the later play "Twelfth Night." It's easy to run out of superlatives talking about this movie, so let's just say the Tom Stoppard script, fantastic cast lead by Gwyneth Paltrow, and ridiculously gorgeous production design deserve nothing but praise.

Caesar Must Die (2012) - From Italy's Taviani brothers comes a look at the efforts of a prison theater program, where the inmates are preparing for a performance of "Julius Caesar." We follow their rehearsals, their discussions of the material, occasionally incorporating bits of their own lives and backgrounds, and finally parts of the final performance. Real convicts played their own roles in the film, adding an extra layer of authenticity to the proceedings.

Chimes at Midnight (1967) - Orson Welles' history of the character of Falstaff is based on parts of multiple Shakespeare plays: "Richard II," "Henry IV Part 1," "Henry IV Part 2," "Henry V," and bits of "The Merry Wives of Windsor." The jovial, tragic old drunk is one of Welles' greatest later performances, and the film lives up to it, particularly the major battle sequences. So it's a real shame that the film remains underseen after decades stuck in legal limbo.

Richard III (1955) - This is my favorite of the Olivier Shakespeare adaptations, largely for Olivier's performance as one of Shakespeare's most vile and entertaining villains, King Richard III. That nose! That hair! That voice! It's no wonder the film is credited with popularizing both the play and the character, and Olivier set the bar for every Richard that followed. And nobody, not even Ian McKellan in the excellent 1995 version, has matched him yet.

Ran (1986) - Not just one of my favorite Shakespeare adaptations, but one of my favorite films, period. Kurosawa's Sengoku-era adaptation of "King Lear" was his final epic, capturing the horror of war and the pain of a family torn apart by pride and greed. The use of color and the spectacular cinematography and the Noh play symbolism are just breathtaking. The names and places may be unfamiliar, but the tragedy is unquestionably Shakesperean.
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