Winner of 7 Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Actress - Gwyneth Paltrow and Best Supporting Actress - Judi Dench, SHAKESPEARE IN LOVE is noted playwright and screenwriter Tom Stoppard’s imaginative restaging and reworking of the imagined life story of William Shakespeare which proceeds to present a fantastical thesis for how he came to write many of the finest dramas and comedies written in the English language. Boasting gorgeous costumes, breathtaking sets and an unmistakably Shakespearean atmosphere, SHAKESPEARE IN LOVE has aged considerably well and looks even more rapturous and resplendent on Blu-ray than it ever has before. The new Blu-ray also comes with a slew of fantastic special features, the most appreciable of all being the two commentary tracks, one from director John Madden and another from assorted cast and crew members, as well as some other winning featurettes. Boasting an all-star cast to best even the Bard’s vaunted coterie of performers themselves, SHAKESPEARE IN LOVE is lousy with pedigree - and nearly every actor makes his or her mark over the quite tight, terse running time of the film. It all plays like a dream.
In addition to the aforementioned Oscar-betrothed leading lady and supporting player, the cast of SHAKESPEARE IN LOVE also boasts recent Oscar-winner for THE KING’S SPEECH, Colin Firth, in an instantly memorable role, as well as a charismatic lead performance by Joseph Fiennes as the titular playwright himself. Additionally, British stage stars Simon Callow, Antony Sher, Imelda Staunton, Tom Wilkinson and Tony Award-winning Australian leading man Geoffrey Rush all make solid impressions in their smaller, featured roles. Yet, as with all of the greatest works of William Shakespeare, the text is the star, and Stoppard’s precise and exacting script (with contributions from Marc Norman) is much like a modern Shakespeare play in the way it juggles moments of levity, intrigue, history, comedy, tragedy and love into the dramatic tapestry of the lovingly assembled film.
While SHAKESPEARE IN LOVE may have been somewhat derided at the time for being too light and frothy to win over that year’s favorite, SAVING PRIVATE RYAN, time has been kind to the theatrically-tinged film, and, dare I say, it is even more enjoyable and entertaining now, on Blu-ray, than it may have even been at the time of its release fifteen years ago. All the world may be a stage, but SHAKESPEARE IN LOVE is a Hollywood film relating to Shakespeare worth your time, attention and investment. Tut tut!
