Whether or not you enjoy watching and absorbing William Shakespeare is almost entirely dependent on the kinds of encounters you have had in your life with his works. If, for example, you had an enthusiastic teacher in high school who helped you crack through the tricky language, or who ignited a spark in some other way for you, then you may enjoy his plays now. Perhaps you saw a stage version or a film adaptation that clicked in just the right way. These are the kinds of experiences I hope high school students are exposed to. And then you have this stuffy BBC interpretation of Othello. With long, drawn out passages, dull delivery and terrible production values, this kind of sloppy work is precisely what turns people off of Shakespeare for life.
Made in 1981, there is very little merit to be found by those who look for tragedies to come to life. The story, of course, involves a Moor who eventually decides to murder his wife after he is convinced that she has been unfaithful to him. Anthony Hopkins is the title character, and his is one of the most dreary performances that I can recall from the knighted actor. For most of the duration, he is calm, subdued and devoid of passion. These are not characteristics that often come to mind when we hear the name Othello. And yet he is a passive background presence dragged into the foreground. In his speech when he speaks of how he and his beloved Desdemona (the equally bland Penelope Wilton) first hooked up, Hopkins is casual and unconvincing.
Bob Hoskins plays Iago. He is comfortable in the role, but not nearly malicious enough. He is sufficiently self-absorbed, but slops his words together at this expense. Anthony Pedley is Roderigo and David Yelland plays the young Cassio, but neither actor infuses any more life into the film.
With meticulous costumes that look absolutely dreadful, this stuffy production emphasizes period accuracy over such basics as the the quality of the story, the pace, and the energy. It is that make-up-and-tights "look" that comes to the layperson's mind whenever Shakespeare is mentioned, and until I saw this movie, I didn't realise that versions like this actually still existed. The text, as rigidly complete as it is, suffers in its delivery in nearly every scene. If this is supposed to be the complete Othello, one need only hold it up to Kenneth Branagh's Hamlet to see the potential for keeping an entire script in tact without sacrificing the audience's interest. Here, none of the dialogue seems like conversation at all, merely a bunch of actors delivering speeches, meanwhile thinking to themselves, "Look at me! I'm doing Shakespeare!" The director, Jonathan Miller, has been responsible for several other made-for-TV adaptations of the Bard's plays. Good God.
