Recent Posts
Almost 400 years after his death, the work of The Bard, the great William Shakespeare, continues to be adapted for the big screen at an amazing rate - by all and sundry.
Rarely will a year go by without some Shakespearean work being redone, reworked or rein-visioned by all manner of different artists - writers, directors, actors etc etc.
He is actually listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as having the most number of screen adaptations by a single author. For the record, Stephen King holds the record for living authors.
Shakespeares body of work is well-known to also be as diverse as any, ranging from the tragic romance of Romeo and Juliet to the comedy of The Twelfth Night to the historical drama of Henry V to the action and revenge of Hamlet. I dont think there was any sci-fi in there, but he can be forgiven, considering his timeline was around the 1600 mark.
It was not long after the invention of film, that the first Shakespearean short was made - King John in 1899. Original moving image adaptations of Romeo and Juliet (1900), Hamlet (1900), Othello (1906), The Tempest (1908), Julius Caeser (1908) and The Merchant of Venice (1908) followed soon after.
Later, British acting greats like Laurence Olivier and Richard Burton would make their careers by bringing Shakespeare to life on stage and, of course, in cinema, just as writer-director-actor Kenneth Branagh has done in more recent times.
Many other actors you wouldnt normally associate with The Bard have tried their hand at his work, in some quite unique and interesting ways. Some good. Some bad. Some just plain odd.
Currently, there are no less than 18 film adaptations either about to be released or in early production, according to The Internet Movie Database, in various forms, including zombie flick Romeo and Juliet vs The Living Dead, the animated Gnomeo and Juliet, and the Untitled Eddie Murphy/Romeo and Juliet Project. God help us with that last one.
Below is a list of actors - while certainly talented in their own right, and, in fact, are some of my absolute favorites - are hardly what you would call Shakespearean, thespian types. Put it this way, they are not from the Kenneth Branagh school of drama
But, then again, the movies that they are appearing in are hardly the work of William Shakespeare in the traditional sense.
11 Not-So Shakespearean Actors Doing Shakespeare in 11 Not-So Shakespearean Movies
REMAKE is becoming a real dirty word. Just about every time I hear it these days I shudder. Shit, what next? I think to myself. What movie next will those unimaginative, unoriginal Hollywood producers get their mitts on. Well, now theyve gone way too far. Way, way, way too far.
I was just thinking last week, while writing a post on the planned overhaul of Teen Wolf, I hope like hell An American Werewolf in Londons name doesnt come up any time soon with regards to its own remake.
A few days later, low and behold, Bloody Disgusting is running a story about just that. It says, news comes in exclusively to BD from a regular tipster that writer/director John Landis has sold the remake rights for An American Werewolf In London to Dimension Films.
Dimension, which is actually the Weinstein Brothers, is currently heading up the Halloween franchise reboot and also has plans for a new Hellraiser series.
Teen Wolf is one thing - it was after all a pretty corny vehicle for a young Michael J. Fox - but An American Werewolf in London is another all together.
It is of course about an American tourist, who while backpacking through the moors of England gets attacked by some werewolf the beer-swilling locals want nothing to do with. Suffice to say, the young Yank subsequently turns into one and goes on a blood-thirsty romp through the streets and subways of London.
Probably the greatest film of its genre ever, yeah, even better than Howling 3: The Marsupials, it was directed by Landis, the man who helmed Michael Jacksons Thriller film-clip, and starred David Naughton as David Kessler, Jenny Agutter as Alex Price and Griffin Dunne as Jack Goodman.
As well as what was just a really interesting take on a very old formula, it had an Academy Award-winning make-up job by Rick Baker that was just brilliant.
While I can understand something like Clash of the Titans, with its Ray Harryhausen claymation, getting redone in this day and age of computer generated imagery, but the effects Baker used 27 years ago still stands up against any CGI.
That scene on the nurses living room floor when David transforms is one of the great scenes. It made the viewer experience every change the main character was experiencing. Just brilliant.
And I love the end when David is confronted in the skin flick cinema by his dead best friend, who he basically left for dead out in the Moors, as well as his werewolf victims.
The actual werewolf itself was pretty amazing too, especially when its running through the city snapping at the heels of passers-by.
Apparently, studio executives hoped Landis would cast his Blues Brothers Dan Aykroyd in the role of David and John Belushi as Jack, but he refused. Which, as good as they were, Im kinda glad about. Naughton hasnt done much else, well, as far as I can see, but he was great in this.
The movie spawned a sequel, An American Werewolf in Paris, some years later, 1997 I believe, but is easily forgotten. As I hope any remake will be.
Courtesy of
In Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, Arnold Schwarzeneggers character describes itself as being a cybernetic organism. We know his type better as simply cyborgs.
The Oxford Dictionary describes a cyborg as a person whose physical tolerances or capabilities are extended beyond normal human limitations by a machine or other external agency that modifies the bodys functioning; an integrated man-machine system.
The less formal Wikipedia says fictional cyborgs are portrayed as a synthesis of organic and synthetic parts, and frequently pose the question of difference between human and machine as one concerned with morality, free will, and empathy. They may be represented as visibly mechanical or as almost indistinguishable from humans.
They are not to be mistaken with an android, which were classifying here as basically a robot merely shaped like a human being. Check out the lamest robots in film here.
Cyborgs can look like Yul Brynner or Arnold Schwarzenegger, more your robotic-based cyborgs that look human from Westworld (1974) and Terminator (1984).
The 600 series had rubber skin. We spotted them easy, but these are new. They look human
sweat, bad breath, everything. Very hard to spot, so says Kyle Reese in Terminator
Or they can look like the helmeted pair of Peter Weller and Darth Vader whose characters in the RoboCop and Star Wars series were once human but given mechanical body parts to not only survive, but thrive.
Wiki goes on to say that cyborgs in fiction often play up a human contempt for over-dependence on technology, particularly when used for war, and when used in ways that threaten free will. Cyborgs are also often portrayed with physical or mental abilities far exceeding a human counterpart (military forms may have inbuilt weapons, among other things).
There have been some great representation of cyborgs on the big screen, such as the aforementioned, as well as the replicants from Blade Runner (1982), headed by Rutger Hauers Roy Batty, and the Borg from Star Trek: First Contact (1996).
But, there have been some shockers. Heres some of the worst
13 Cyborg Films That Need Termination
GENERAL RAMBLINGS
TOTAL Recall is, in my humble opinion, the best Arnold Schwarzenegger film in existence, narrowly beating Predator, Terminator 2 and maybe Hercules Goes Bananas (when he was known as Arnold Strong).
[ Click here to read more ]
PREVIEW
I remember way back in 2001 when Donnie Darko was about to be released. I don't think I've been as excited about seeing a movie - that wasn't related to Star Wars or Batman.
[ Click here to read more ]
|
|
|
Add Comments
Comments (6)
Read More
Comment by Movie Mall
on Coming Out of the Closet
Movie Catcher
The Invisible Sky