A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM

Today I saw the DVD of Michael Hoffman's 1999 film of Shakespeare's A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM, with a cast including Rupert Everett as Oberon the fairy king.  Everett is an actor who interests me:  I've been seeing a lot of his films on DVD, even the trashy 1983 miniseries PRINCESS DAISY where he was the heroine's evil stepbrother.

This version has an interesting cast, including Michelle Pfeiffer and Kevin Kline as Bottom. (James Cagney's Bottom was the best thing in Max Reinhardt's rather slow 1935 version, which I saw last year.) Stanley Tucci's Puck is counter-intuitive but witty.  Personally, I find Calista Flockhart goofy.

This version has a handsome, original look--it's set in Italy toward 1900, with the lovers riding bicycles--and some nice opera music.  No doubt they were inspired by Kenneth Branagh's MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING.  But at times it tried too hard to make Shakespeare "accessible," with a mud-wrestling scene and some not very necessary nudity. (Back in the 1990s it was the fashion to insert nudity in Shakespeare movies:  see also OTHELLO and RICHARD III.)

Of course, maybe I was ill-disposed to it because I was feeling sick. (Hope I feel better tomorrow.)