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There’s a tragic beauty to Moses Ingram’s turn as the doomed Lady Macduff. Besides Gleeson’s hearty-yet-commanding presence as King Duncan, Corey Hawkins brings heartbreaking poignancy to Macduff, Macbeth’s old friend-turned mortal enemy. As Lady Macbeth, Frances McDormand cuts a positively indomitable figure: Eyes aflame, jaw set firm as a castle gate, this is a woman who will strike fear into even a general of the king’s army.Įven Shakespeare knew the peril of being a supporting player to masters like Washington and McDormand: Whenever a “well-graced actor leaves the stage,” he observed in Richard II, the audience is “idly bent on him that enters next, thinking his prattle to be tedious.” Strong leads demand, perhaps, even stronger secondary actors, and Coen has cast an abundance of them. Of course, it helps to have one of literature’s premier scolds in your corner. The transition, one of the more difficult in theater history, is indecipherable here Washington’s Macbeth seems as surprised as we are by the ease with which he moves from faithful servant to fearsome assassin. Urged on by three truly horrifying witches (all played by British stage legend Kathryn Hunter), Macbeth morphs from a decorated warrior in the service of King Duncan (Brendan Gleeson) to a treacherous traitor who will stop at nothing to sit on Duncan’s throne. The sets, really little more than areas of foreboding darkness arranged against angular swatches of glaring light, are as spare as the plot - a straightforward tale of ambition, obsession, and betrayal that nevertheless casts an iambic x-ray on the heart of human folly.ĭenzel Washington, his close-cropped hair peppered with the snows of age, breathes bitter life into the character of Macbeth. Related in crisp black and white, the shortest of William Shakespeare’s tragedies unspools in a brisk hour-and-three-quarters. Such films don’t come along often, but such a film is Joel Coen’s The Tragedy of Macbeth - a retelling of a much-told tale that, miraculously, somehow convinces us it is being told for the first time.
#Beyondcorp for the rest ofus series
The best films provide a series of moments, each memorable and unique, that, strung together, create a whole of seamless artistry. In theaters now streaming on Apple TV+ January 14 Writers: Joel Coen (adaptation of William Shakespeare’s play) Stars: Denzel Washington, Frances McDormand, Brendan Gleeson, Corey Hawkins