Dorathen Better Late Then Never

Kien Navarro Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

Frances Chung Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

Matylda Swan It is a whirlwind of delight --- attractive actors, stunning couture, spectacular sets and outrageous parties.

john-lauritsen The greatest fault of this performance is that many of the actors could not do justice to the words of Shakespeare. There are no subtitles. Some of the dialogue in Much Ado is in prose and some is in poetry (pentameter), but here one could hardly tell the difference. The actors put all their energies in emoting, making faces, flailing their arms around in meaningless gestures -- but they failed to enunciate. Some were worse than others. The actress who played Beatrice sometimes spoke much too fast, rushing the words together and producing gibberish. She was pretty, but that didn't compensate from her inability to deliver the Shakespeare words. The sound quality was not good, which made things even worse. The sets and costumes were nice enough, and the actors looked good enough, but so what? I'd rather watch a Shakespeare play on a bare stage, where the actors just wore blue jeans and T-shirts -- so long as I really heard the Shakespeare lines.

Troopie This remains, for me, one of the best of this superb BBC series & certainly the best version of this particular play. This production saw no need to dress up the actors in ridiculous fake-military costumes (a vice Branagh shows off in all his productions, I know not why) or cut those parts which it didn't like (either do Shakespeare as he wrote it or write your own play!). Robert Lindsay reveals previously unsuspected Shakespearian talent & I would dearly love to see him take on some other such roles. He is superb in this, using his comic ability to bring out the humorous essence of Benedick & the beautiful Cherie Lunghi (who has never shown me a poor performance, be it in Shakespeare, Hornblower or even "A Touch of Frost") is a perfect partner, being both cuttingly witty & enticing -- enough to make any Benedick risk her barbs to chase her! Admittedly, Jon Finch isn't as good as Denzil Washington, who also showed untapped Shakespearian talent (a future Othello or even Iargo, maybe?) but he isn't actually bad. All in all, a joy to watch & a great introduction to Shakespeare's lighter works. Sincerely recommended.

tonstant viewer Robert Lindsay is an excellent Benedick, punchy and precise in word, action and emotion. Cherie Lunghi finds less variation in her Beatrice, but is nonetheless quite good.Jon Finch camps outrageously as Don Pedro, delivering his lines in frank imitation of Sir Laurence Olivier at his giddiest. How did this apparent party turn wind up in here? But it does not distract from the progress of the play.The rest of the cast is fine and the whole affair moves at a reasonable pace. The physical production is beautiful to the eye, inspired by the finest Italian Renaissance painters. Highly recommended.

rice-17 Saw it 21 years ago, and still remember it as fabulous. Lindsay and Lunghi are delightful. it's work like this that really shows why Auntie Beeb is a national (international) treasure. OK, so I'm a refugee Limey, but why is it that American TV can't produce anything even a tiny fraction as good as this?I really don't have too much to say about the production itself, since I saw it so long ago. It's just that I have such a wonderful, warm memory of it.Incidentally, I like the Branagh production. Just rented it to watch this evening, as a matter of fact, to get a bit of a bard fix. But if my local video rental shop had offered the BBC version, I'd have grabbed that one instead in a flash.