When I popped Titus into my dvd player the other night I didn't know what to expect. I've never been overly crazy about Shakespeare and I had definitely never heard of his play (Titus Andronicus) this movie is based on. I mostly had chosen the film because I'm a big Jessica Lange fan and knew she was in it.
It took me a while to find my way through this crazy, violent mix of time periods and fashion, but once I started feeling comfortable with the dialogue (closer to Shakespeare's original than ours) and the actual plot (a good chunk of which is due to a bloodthirsty need for revenge) I found myself bizarrely fascinated with the colors and just how consumed Jessica Lange's character becomes with her determination to avenge her son's death.
If you go on the imdb message board you'll witness a fierce debate on whether Titus is too violent and disoriented in time to be any good. Many people don't like the film; many people do.
Anthony Hopkins once said he felt this was half King Lear, half Silence of the Lambs. I'd said that at times Titus feels more like half Saw.
I like the review Amazon has on their site:
Amazon.com essential video
Considered by many to be Shakespeare's worst play, Titus Andronicus is a bloodthirsty tragedy full of villainous heroes and bottomless revenge--hardly the stuff of big-screen directorial debuts, it would seem. Yet Julie Taymor dives headfirst into moviemaking with Titus, a spectacular adaptation that manages to find beauty and humor in the piles of carnage.
The story begins simply enough by Shakespearean standards: celebrated Roman warrior Titus Andronicus (Anthony Hopkins) returns from a hard-won victory to bury his slain sons and avenge their deaths by killing the eldest son of his enemy, Tamora, queen of the Goths (Jessica Lange). Tamora responds by seducing the impressionable new emperor and setting all of Rome into a downward spiral of revenge, madness, and death.
Taymor, who won a Tony for her Broadway production of The Lion King, throws all her theatrical sensibilities at the story--armies are exquisitely choreographed, blood is shed so beautifully that it hardly seems real, and characters are costumed in symbolic combinations of ancient Roman and 20th-century garb.
She plays up the dark comedy at every opportunity, lending a carnival flavor to the story's most gruesome moments. Excellent performances from Hopkins (whose deranged Titus is more than a little reminiscent of Hannibal Lecter), Lange, and the supporting cast help make the endless treachery credible. --Claire Campbell
Taymor, who won a Tony for her Broadway production of The Lion King, throws all her theatrical sensibilities at the story--armies are exquisitely choreographed, blood is shed so beautifully that it hardly seems real, and characters are costumed in symbolic combinations of ancient Roman and 20th-century garb.
She plays up the dark comedy at every opportunity, lending a carnival flavor to the story's most gruesome moments. Excellent performances from Hopkins (whose deranged Titus is more than a little reminiscent of Hannibal Lecter), Lange, and the supporting cast help make the endless treachery credible. --Claire Campbell
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