Title: Interesting; Not Great
Review: The movie is a fairly faithful rendition of Shakespeare's Richard II, including most of its text, and done in roughly fourteenth century costumes. Birney, playing Richard II, is best in the early acts. The introspective force of Richard in the later acts is not well conveyed. Bolingbroke is downplayed. The most powerful acting is in the parts of Gaunt, Mowbray, and Northumberland, who is wonderfully (and appropriately) scary.I recommend this video to help people studying the play get a quick good sense of what is going on in Richard II, and help them over any language difficulties in the written text.I do not think this is a great performance. I have heard there is a version with John Gielgud as Gaunt which is supposed to be great, but I have been unable to find it.
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