Love's Labours Lost

Love's Labour's Lost Every bit as silly as the cover promises, this Kenneth Branagh's 2000 attempt puts Shakespeare's somewhat unimpressive text to all kinds of Fred and Ginger songs (written by Cole Porter, Ira Gershwin, and Irving Berlin, mostly).

I think the effort was admirable, at least. The acting worked (I recognized and liked many of the cast - except Alicia Silverstone, who disappointed me), and the story seemed as plausible as any of Shakespeare's comedies, but so many other, little facets felt half-assed. The sets felt stagey (which isn't necessarily bad, except that so many other aspects of the film were meant to be rooted in film tradition), and the dancing. . . well, you can't have Fred and Ginger without, well, Fred and/or Ginger. Perhaps if it had been filmed in black and white it might have worked better.

Film critics on rottentomatoes.com didn't like it either, giving it a predictable 48%. Most of them found that it simply didn't work. The project seemed vague and unsuccessful, but one critic did point out that the whole idea was very imaginative. That's absolutely true. With an off-the-wall project like this, it's as likely to fail as succeed. Unfortunately, this one failed.

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