Shakespeare on Film

Since the birth of Shakespearean cinema in 1899, there have been around 500 film adaptations in which the Bard has been taken to outer space, downtown Mumbai, and feudal Japan. Exploring this astonishing array of films from early cinema to the present, Shakespeare on Film: Such Things As Dreams Are Made Of analyses Shakespearean cinema in four major contexts - performance, adaptation, film style and popularisation- and interprets his unique ability to penetrate cultures, mindsets and languages from across the world. The book reveals Shakespeare's continuing currency in contemporary culture, and critically examines the dialogues between cultures, mediums and historical periods that emerge within a study of Shakespeare on film. Includes analysis of Orson Welles' Othello (1952), Roman Polanski's Macbeth (1971), Akira Kurosawa's Ran (1985) and Baz Luhrmann's Romeo + Juliet (1996).