Shakespeare in the Movies: From the Silent Era to Today

Rating:
Summary: In a word (or two) - All Encompassing
Review: Brode once again nails it! Anyone even remotely interested in Willy Shake should add this study to their collection. Written in the informative and highly entertaining manner common to his work, Douglas Brode provides a detailed road map through the works of Willy Shake as they have been applied to the silver screen. Another hit!

Rating:
Summary: Careless with Shakespeare and with Movies
Review: When writing about Shakespeare in the Movies, it's helpful to know something about *both* topics. Brode, a prolific commentator on film, is remarkably unconcerned about Shakespeare's life, his works, their theatrical traditions, and even their cinematic traditions -- all of which have inspired and informed the films about which he here endeavors to write. The results are so irresponsible that the original publisher has tried to distance itself as far as possible from this travesty. An earlier edition of the book prompted the following assessments from Amazon.com reviewers:

"This book is so bad, Amazon needs to come up with a NO STAR option. There are a stunning number of factual errors. Literally dozens, maybe into three digits. The author's grasp of the material is always superficial. I can't imagine a worse book on this subject. I know this sounds like hyperbole. It is not."

"Read the review in the Spring 2000 issue of *The Shakespeare Newsletter* before purchasing this book. The review begins, 'Briefly, this is so dreadfully bad a book that it, quite literally, ought to be withdrawn from publication'(18); the review amply substantiates this judgment in several thousand words quoting and describing the egregious errors in this book."

This is not just a matter of bad scholarship: the same laziness in regard to Shakespeare himself is also evident in Brode's pedestrian readings of some compelling experiments in adapting Shakespeare's plays for the screen.