The Tempest:- BBC Shakespeare Collection [1980]

I'm glad the BBC made these films of the Shakespeare plays. This is a faithful production of the Tempest and the acting and the cast are good, though I'd agree with another reviewer that Ariel and the extras are a bit camp.

Michael Hordern was a fine actor and he's excellent as Prospero. On the whole I would say the BBC have done a decent job but it does feel a bit stagey and was clearly made on a limited budget.

If you're a student or you're not familiar with The Tempest then I think this film would be an excellent introduction. I've not seen Jarman's Tempest, but I would think that his film would be better appreciated if you are already familiar with the play and its themes.

I love Olivier's work, but the best Shakepeare play, on film, in my opinion, is Polanski's Macbeth. I'd love to see a film of the Tempest on a generous budget, made by a top director.

One of the most mysterious plays by Shakespeare that will remind you of other plays they may be remakes of, like "Twelfth Night" and a shipwreck there too. The usurper is also common in "As You Like it" for example, or "Hamlet" in a tragic mode. The use of fairies, spirits and even monsters are not uncommon in his plays like "A Midsummer Night's Dream", or "The Merry Wives of Windsor", or "Macbeth" of course in a tragic mode.

But this play is special because it actually starts the action on the ship when it is being shipwrecked by a storm. The situation on the absolutely isolated island is difficult for the "survivors" because it is in the hands of a "sorcerer" who has enslaved some monster, Caliban, and has put to his service Ariel and his band of spirits. That gives the island a magic look and sound that is charming and disquieting, and the master, Prospero, can control the tempest, the shipwreck and the survival of the victims.

In fact he knows who is on the ship and he manipulates the elements to both get a husband to his daughter, get reinstated in his position of Duke of Milan by forgiving the people who ousted him, get his real vengeance from the manipulators and plotters, and go back home after liberating Caliban and freeing Ariel of his dependence.

All together it is a simple play, a comedy of sorts and hence there would be little to say about it. And yet it is somewhere more complex than that. What makes it different, deeper? It is the belief that if you have the proper knowledge, the necessary books, the patience and the peace of mind necessary you can control the world both in its physical essence and in its supernatural dimension. And that is not only a simple trick used on the stage. The whole plot, the whole play cannot work if those spirits do not exist. Somewhere there is a real belief you can move tempests and mountains with proper spiritual faith.

There is also the exploitation of the local and slightly underdeveloped native enslaved to do all the hard work and difficult tasks. Colonialism is all contained in that attitude that considers that local native as not being in anyway able to get to the civilized level that might provide him with a soul. And he insists on the vicious nature of this native who can get drunk easily and then become murderous, and who can only dream of killing his master out of some vengeance.

Then the rest is more common with the social vignettes on the political plotters, and on the servants that only dream of getting drunk on their master's wine and of stealing all they can from their masters or anyone else. There is a deep social pessimism in this play: the social servants are unredeemable and are unredeemed even if they are redressed.

Finally this play does not work at all like many others. It could have been a tragedy but it was made into a comedy and there are no tricks like four weddings or whatever. Just one plain and simple wedding. There is no vengeance really since it all ends up in forgiveness and some verbal repentance. And the tempest that comes out of the mind of one man is there to bring that fake justice. It repairs nothing and it does not re-establish the balance of before. It is very fine and dandy to go back to Milan but you have lost so many years being no one in an island lost in the middle of some ferocious ocean. It is not even a comedy because the end is just a dull rebalancing act that brings no fun and no justice, and there is no justice if there is no punishment and reparation, and no fun if there is no justice.

I like the play because of its mysterious and magical atmosphere and because of the pure and virginal love affair it contains, but it is like some after thought or testament, a regret before going for good, or whatever you may think, but after such a play that ends in such a flat leveling there is nothing to add or say and you could add long dancing interludes or singing intermezzos that would not add one iota of depth to this play.

I have seen that play so often and in so many countries and places that I start knowing it by heart, and yet I do not discover anything new in it any more, as I do with practically all other plays by Shakespeare. It is a case where I would easily accept that this play was written in the circle in which Shakespeare was shininh, but maybe not by the master himself.

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU

I bought this dvd because my son is acting in a school production of the Tempest so he and we needed to be able to see the whole play. I expected the BBC and Miachael Hordern to provide a good version, especially as this was part of a BBC project to produce the entire Shakespeare canon.

However this is an unambitious pedestrian production. The first problem is that, with the BBC's desire to stick with the whole text but stay within reasonable time limits, large sections of the play, especially early on, are gabbled through at an excessive pace. The opening storm scene in particular is almost unbearable with heavy background noises and much rushing about and bellowing making it impossible to follow the action - Shakespeare's wordiness is totally unsuited to such attempts at realism.

The second problem is that, apart from Hordern as Prospero, and his fey sidekick, Arial, and maybe Caliban, the acting is horribly wooden. None of the players seem at all comfortable in their roles. My son was horrified by his character, Goncalo, as he could not imagine playing such a part, and I'm sure that comes from the ineffectual way it is presented here.

That is made worse by a struggle with the medium. There is a balance to be found between the values and techniques of stage and TV but it has not been found here. This feels like an amateur stage production performed in front of a TV camera, neither medium working as it could. Maybe I've forgotten how far we have come since 1980.

However there is one chink of light in the whole affair. Arial, and his crew of spirits, are hugely entertaining although maybe not intentionally. I have never seen such an outrageously camp set of performances and I can only assume that somebody subversive cast a bunch of gay actors and dancers in the male parts and told them to ham it up as far as they could - if they were going to be faeries they had better be extreme fairies. The female spirits are deliciously pathetic - Miranda and her prince are in ecstasies over their betrothal gift from Prospero, consisting of a bunch of gawky women in floaty drapes simpering about and wailing in that semi-musical style that opera sometimes uses when speech would do perfectly well. It would be embarrassing in the Ambridge Christmas show, here you can only assume that they meant it to be embarrassing.