William Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice Reviews

Saw it last night on DVD and my husband and I are still talking about it this morning: is it anti-Semetic? Can you talk about uncomfortable things without appearing to endorse them? I thought it was beautifully done; Pacino was great as the self-righteous man who looks to the law for his comeuppance and instead finds himself hung by the law--a wonderful take on the fact that the ruling class will always have its way no matter how just your cause. Irons played a somewhat cowardly Antonio...was he like that in the play? Don't remember. Fiennes was singularly unappealing as Bassanio. Wassup with that, Portia? The unbelievable bit of Portia and her maid playing learned (though young and male) doctors from Padua was so hare-brained it was like something out of a Woody Allen film (specifically the part in Sleeper where Diane Keaton and Woody Allen are operating on the dictator's nose), but that's Shakespeare, not Radford, so can't fault the movie.

I've got a bit of a love/hate thing going on when it comes to Shakespeare. The Merchant of Venice is one of his that is in the middle for me though because I don't like the story and It comes under the 'Women pretending to be men' category which is firmly in the 'hate' section but then I really like the character of Shylock. I have always thought the story should end with the court scene and watching it on film only confirms this for me. So in some respects it's an honest adaptation. It looks good most of the time although I spotted a couple of unforgivable fake moustaches (and I don't mean on the women). The acting is also very hit and miss. Jeremy Irons is classically trained and he knows how to do Shakespeare justice, as does John Sessions and a few others who are well practised in the Bards work. Al Pacino's performance is very good to, although I wasn't so sure at first. His does end up being the only good reason to watch though as others stink up Shakespeare to high heaven. Kris Marshall makes it look like a pantomime but then look what happened to his much hyped future career. Joseph Fiennes was obviously cast as a safety net after the success of Shakespeare in Love but his performance was about as safe as an asbestos gum shield. I can only imagine Lynn Collins was cast because Gwyneth Paltrow was busy. Not my favourite Shakespeare play with an equally unlikable film -stating that persecution of the Jews was rife in the 1600's doesn't make me enjoy watching it or make me feel like I'm watching an important piece of history, so for those reasons I can't recommend.

This is a work of art. A fantastic piece of Shakespears work. Al Pacino is brilliant. An outstanding and unforgettable performance.

The world was raising. Thunderous canyons shot from below to meet my footsteps. Forests rose and died behind my back. Birds evolved and turned to dust before me. The sky was fire and shadow, and it covered the sun like a closing fist. My hair was a wild brown spirit dancing in the tempest. My consciousness tore apart into a thousand different pieces, each shot itself like a rocketship to a thousand stars. The moon crashed into the earth. Humanity begged to be. Civilization threw its hands up. Existence screamed.

My body is an auditorium. Memory is music fading, acoustics wearing.

Starlight is taxed. Clouds rule the universe. The bridges I walk end before they begin. All the islands and planets are sinking. An air just above me is a melancholy fragrance, and yellowness stains reality. The madness of my flesh is annihilated. I am just a tangle of wires choking a soul, stranded in a breath and under the dead mountains. The edge is deep. I let go, and fall back into a flock of glimmering crystal angels. I dream that they are building me beautiful white wings.

[font=Century Gothic][color=red]First off, I want to mention that it usually takes me a couple of versions to get fully versed to a Shakespeare play. And I had not seen a version of "The Merchant of Venice" before. Now, I knew about the accusations of anti-semitism and having seen "Theatre of Blood"(1973), I had also heard about the pound of flesh.[/color][/font]
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[font=Century Gothic][color=#ff0000]"The Merchant of Venice" starts out in Venice, 1596 and there are grave restrictions against the Jewish community. Bassanio(Joseph Fiennes) is looking to his friend, Antonio(Jeremy Irons) to settle his debts, so he can woo the lovely, Portia.(Lynn Collins) So, Bassanio goes off to the First National Bank of Shylock(Al Pacino) for a loan of 3000 Ducats and uses Antonio to guarantee the debt. Antonio is confident he can pay Shylock back, since he is expecting heavy returns on investments he has just made. If not, then the debt is to be repaid with a pound of flesh...[/color][/font]
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[font=Century Gothic][color=#ff0000]This is certainly great looking and it is well acted. I did not care for the story's ending, though.[/color][/font]

It's getting to the point where New Yorkers of Italian descent are not only more American than Italian, but more American than, well, a lot of other American cultures, though I am glad to see that Al Pacino is heading to Venice to embrace his Italian roots, even though I wouldn't exactly have pegged him as a very Shakespearean. Actually, now that I think about it, Pacino is perfect for the Shakespearean stage, because Shakespeare was pretty well know for writing plenty of material for scenery chewing, something that Pacino is no stranger to. Settle down kids, I don't mean that kind of bad overacting type of scenery chewing, because Al Pacino remains quite the actor, it's just that in recent, well, decades, he's been going ever so delightfully crazy, though less in a Shakespeare way and more in his own way. In advanced, I'm sorry for referencing the line coming up, but I just can't help but say that, going into this film, while I was aware that it featured a more restrained Pacino, I was still kind of waiting for him to whip out an under-barrel M203 grenade launcher and start blowing everyone away while saying, "Does saith good morrow to thy small companion!" "Where did Al Pacino get an under-barrel M203 grenade launcher in 1596 Venice", you ask? Hey, he's Al Pacino and he can do whatever he wants, and plus, it wouldn't be the first anachronism in a Shakespeare plays. Eh, whatever, Shakespeare still made some awesome plays to be made into some pretty good films, with this film not being one of the genuinely good films, which isn't to say that it's bad, because it is still quite enjoyable, though still not without its share of fatal faults.

As with many Shakespeare adaptations, this film stays faithful to the dry grace of the original text, so much so that it comes off as fairly slow, limping along with a kind of dryness that renders it often dull and almost aimless in its story flow, with the final being particularly bloated and even slow in pace, to the point of losing steam after a while. Still, here and there, when the film does take a shift in flow, the act is not always terribly organic, with changes in story focus tripping in an off-putting and uneven fashion that slows down the momentum of the impact for only a moment, though just long enough to land a blow to the resonance of the film. Of course, what might very well taint the film's impact the most is something that it is consistent in, and that is collapse so deep and so often into Shakespearean tropes, until after a while, it grows rather bland. The film makes little, if any attempt to punch harder or more uniquely than any other Shakespeare interpretation, and it is for that reason why the punch falling more limp than it does in other Shakespeare interpretations, for whether it be because I've grown jaded from my exposure to many different takes of Shakespeare or because the film's being overwhemingly and dully faithful to the source material is palpable whether you're a jaded Shakespeare adaptation viewer or not, the film just doesn't have enough bite to it to impress, and with its aimless slow spots and uneven points further dragging down impact, the film falls as rather bland. There's little about this Shakespeare piece that's worth remembering, and the final product emerges an underwhelming filler of one, and yet, there in lays the film's almost winning charm. What the film gets wrong is much too glaring for the film to stand as genuinely good, yet it just barely falls to underwhelming, because what it does do right it does with as much skill as you would expect from a mostly competently-crafted Shakespeare interpretation. Through all of the final product's faults, the consensus had it right when it deemed the film a respectable Shakespeare interpretation, and for quite a few reasons.

The film is a handsome one, with Benoît Delhomme's cinematography being consistently attractive in its lighting, with occasions in which it really emphasizes the environment in a stunning fashion, and that visual grace goes complimented by the audible grace that is Jocelyn Pook's score, which may be often conventional, yet remains fairly well-done and helps in seeling you on this world. What further sells you on the world is, well, the structure of the world, because although 1590s Venice surprisingly doesn't quite have enough sweep to it to really show off the production value, the film remains riddled with nifty production designs that may not immediately transport you to the time, but ease you into comfortably and buyably. For this, credit is largely due to Michael Radford's direction, which is quite decidedly spotty, yet has its moments where it really does sell you on the world, as well as, well, even its dialect. While this film is faithful to a fault to Joe Schmo's Shakespeare adaptations, where almost every dialogue-faithful Shakespeare screen adaptation glorifies Shakespeare's text to the point of really letting you know just how alien to our modern dialect Shakespeare's writing was, this adaptation goes handled with assurance by Radford so strong that there are many points in which he brings the dialect down to earth and has it genuinely connect. True, Shakespearean dialect is so very distinctive, so it should pretty much go without saying that there are still plenty of points in this film where the alienness of the dialogue really does bleed through and leave an impression, yet just as often, Radford leaves the dialogue to fit into both its own and our world with enough comfortable snugness to help in selling you on the environment, as well as leaves you to go reminded of just how snappy Shakespeare was when it came to dialogue. What further convinces you of this world are the performances, many of which are sparklingly charismatic, if not rather nuanced performances, and Al Pacino, in particular, steals the show by producing strong charm that, when broken up by some genuine subtle depth and layers, as well as the occasional piece of intense emoting, really absorbs a lot of humanity and engagement value from the Shylock character as a compelling tragic figure. Yes indeed, the film has quite a few strengths, yet the point is that it doesn't have enough punch to it to really milk the strengths, thus making for a very underwhelmingly been-there-done-that Shakespeare adaption, yet still one that's worth a watch, because its strengths still stand and are generally firmly effective in such a stance.

Overall, the film gets to be occasionally uneven in focus, when it's not as dryly limp and almost aimless-feeling as other Shakespeare adaptations, which isn't to say that slowness is the only thing that this film takes from other Shakespeare interpretations, as what we're left facing is a film that's conventional and overly faithful to the point of beingh brought down to the state of rather bland and underwhelming, though just barely, as the film is quite respectable in its competent handling of visual style and production designs, with mostly inspired direction and consistently inspired performances - particularly that of Al Pacino - particularly breathing life into this world and ultimately helping in leaving Michael Radford's take on "The Merchant of Venice" to stand as a consistently enjoyable film, even if its general blandness keeps it from transcending too far past simply enjoyable.

2.5/5 - Fair

A glossy, effective adaptation filled with impressive performances. Pacino stands out in one of his best to date. An unfairly overlooked gem.

The problem with this movie is that it focuses far too much on the antisemitism of late 16th century Venice and not nearly enough on Shakespeare's material, which is why this movie shouldn't've been made in the first place: because starting the film with explaining how there was a strong prejudice against Jews certainly sets the comedic mood at a abysmal low for what Shakespeare considered to be a whimsical comedy, and if they hadn't justified the antisemitism then it would've been extremely offending. At any rate, Shakespeare intended the humor to be in the antisemitism against Shylock (Al Pacino), and since there's no reason why we should find that funny nowadays; there's no reason they should've made this film. I mean there are things that work by focusing more on the period than the substance-- like Gladiator or the HBO series "Rome"-- but the fact of the matter is that this is goddamn Shakespeare and having grimy period piece set design and grizzly voiced British actors doesn't make the mark! Jeremy Irons is pretty good though, and Al Pacino essentially rehashes his character from Glengarry Glen Ross just so he can burst during the "If you prick us, do we not bleed" monologue. Recommended if you're teaching a high school English class and you want your students to see a respectable staging. Otherwise, I'd skip it. 62/100

This film is a very faithful adaptation of the Shakespeare play. It?s set in the original period, the text hasn?t been cut very much, and very little has been re-envisioned. It is perhaps most notable for the performance of Al Pacino as Shylock. While I wouldn?t quite call his work brilliant, he clearly does at least give a damn here and he never falls back on that autopilot persona he seems to rely on recently. Theoretically, this has the makings of a great Shakespeare adaptation here, and yet this never quite achieves greatness. Frankly, I think this is one of the rare cases where Shakespeare lets the adaptation down rather than the reverse. The Merchant of Venice is a play that oddly shifts between high drama and farcical comedy, the first third is light, the second act is dark, and then it all devolves into uninteresting relationship antics in the end.

Great!

Everytime you cast Jeremy Irons or Kenneth Branaugh in a Shakespearean play, the film is critically successful. But if you include an on-screen wuss like Joseph Fiennes and expect his masculinity to soar, you're sadly mistaken. Pacino as Shylock is well-suited, although Fiennes seriously might want to consider having his penis transformed into a fake vagina (after seeing his wussed-out performance).

If you're not a fan of Shakespeare, watch if you're a fan of Pacino. Some of his best acting since the DDA, Serpico, And Justice For All and Godfather days, excluding the recent Angels in America, awesome acting there too.

This is a work of art. A fantastic piece of Shakespears work. Al Pacino is brilliant. An outstanding and unforgettable performance.

This movie is one of my favorite plays transformed into a movie. Yes, Paccino is amazing as Shylock. That's a given. The themes this play and movie touch upon are vast and deep. But the movie is fun as well. Portia's process of finding a suitor and her playful helping and entrapment of Bassanio is both comical and scary (from a guys point of view). The comical romance of this story can be both overshadowed by the deep themes and in the movie Paccino's performance. Nevertheless, they are there to explore and why I have again visited this movie in Feb. 2010 and given it a review.

my fave shakespeare play. joseph fiennes and jeremy irons chemistry in this movie is so hot!! loved it. Portia was alirght. al pacino is awesome also as shylock the jew!

an aesthetically delightful adaptation of a top-notch Shakespeare work. the costumes and music added a terrific third element to the marvelous acting (Pacino's Shylock is absolutely brilliant) and the beautiful backdrop of Venice. a well-interpreted tragi-comedic portrayal of a true English classic.

Ugh. Long movie, and I ended up fast forwarding through some parts. I don't know why, but this is just one of Shakespeare's works that I haven't really ever liked all that much. That being said, the acting was well done, and I really liked the actress who played Portia. She did a good job with that character.

Al...Jeremy and Joseph are all flawless....this is one of the best interpetations of a shakespere play ever!!

i normally find the Bard to be dull....but when u watch Al as Shylock....ur sucked in and want to see him go on...he is awesome!!

Sublimely twisted Shakespeare. A film that lends to shock and laughter . Surely one of Pacino's strongest performances.

William Shakespeare is brilliant and an absolute classic writer. But the movie could of been better, but no one can get exactly what a writer who has died at least 500 years ago.