King Lear Reviews

[font=Century Gothic][color=darkslategray]My love-hate relationship with Jean-Luc Godard continues here with his 1987 film "King Lear." It starts off with Norman Mailer and ends with Woody Allen. What it's about is much less clear: one of William Shakespeare's descendants is hunting around for the old master's material while meanwhile running into various people including Burgess Meredith and Molly Ringwald, playing respectively, a writer obsessed with Jewish gangsters and his daughter, Cordelia. When he's done with Shakespeare's corpse, Godard goes to work on Virginia Woolf's corpse...[/color][/font]
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[font=Century Gothic][color=#2f4f4f]What does any of this have to do with King Lear? Very little, I think. But then I think that's the idea.[/color][/font]

This is one of those films that are technically really good, but I didnt personally enjoy. I dont know why, maybe I was just not in the mood for an experimental film, or maybe I was just really sleepy. I could still see the film for what it is, a film that is just peculiar, even for an experimental film. Now, that's an achievement. It is only upon reflection that I realize what made this film truly great: King Lear may be one of the greatest adaptations of anything ever.

This is the best po-mo, post-structuralist, graduate student film that I have ever seen. In the midst of trying so hard to fulfill her role, Molly Ringwald silently expresses total befuddlement as to what the film is about. Running out of funding during shooting, Godard perseveres with a kitchen collander and fishing lures to bring us a true slice of great art at the end of the 20th century. A charming, funny, film that Herzog would appreciate as a documentary disguising itself as a film about Shakespeare.

[font=Century Gothic][color=darkslategray]My love-hate relationship with Jean-Luc Godard continues here with his 1987 film "King Lear." It starts off with Norman Mailer and ends with Woody Allen. What it's about is much less clear: one of William Shakespeare's descendants is hunting around for the old master's material while meanwhile running into various people including Burgess Meredith and Molly Ringwald, playing respectively, a writer obsessed with Jewish gangsters and his daughter, Cordelia. When he's done with Shakespeare's corpse, Godard goes to work on Virginia Woolf's corpse...[/color][/font]
[font=Century Gothic][color=#2f4f4f][/color][/font]
[font=Century Gothic][color=#2f4f4f]What does any of this have to do with King Lear? Very little, I think. But then I think that's the idea.[/color][/font]