Best thing: Obviously the film is absolutely gorgeous, but the very best thing here is Fassbender's performance.
Worst thing: I know a lot of people have been concerned about mumbling here, but I think really all their problem really comes down to is a strong Scottish accent from the cast. I used subtitles and I think that was fine. This is actually a film with very little I feel able to fault. For worst thing, I'm going to opt for the opening child funeral. I know why that scene is included, but I think it's a bit of a flat way to start the film. (Though certainly not a deal breaker.)
A big improvement over Roman Polanski's version is that the film doesn't use voiceover. The lines are always delivered on screen by the actors, so we always get a proper performance rather than actors staring into space while their voice plays in the background.
This version of Macbeth shares the ambition of Polanski's version to be a movie rather than a play caught on camera, but here the solution is that characters are often talking to themselves when lines would originally have been directed towards the audience. (Expressions of betrayal are always stated neatly out of earshot of the betrayee.)
The blood, the passion, the violence, the madness. Everything is here, the performances are wonderful and this also doesn't include the random unnecessary nudity of Polanski's film. The story of Macbeth's opponents is also handled very well, capturing the full emotional consequences of Macbeth's cruelty.
This is an excellent adaptation and, from my experience, one of the better Shakespeare adaptations.
A+
A Bucket of Blood (1959)
Best thing: The central performance of Dick Miller is brilliant. I need to see more films with this actor. So far I've mainly seen him in Joe Dante movies but I also saw him in the original Little Shop of Horrors. He always gives an enthusiastic comedic performance and there's always a twinkle in his eye. It's so wonderful to see him in a leading role and it's actually strange to see him playing a low confidence weirdo rather than the confident out-spoken figures he normally plays.
Worst thing: Well actually the worst thing is how terrible the DVD transfer is. This was a very low quality copy of the film and I feel that will have had a real impact on my appreciation of this film. But dealing with the content, I think the opening is the worst part. We start off with a dreary beatnik poem set to annoying awkward jazz accompaniment. Even though our protagonist is in the foreground the insistent irritating drone of the onstage performer focus us to recognise it and I found it incredibly distracting. Perhaps it's necessary for us to recognise how ridiculously pretentious this art scene is, but wow, was there no other way?
I'm a sucker for horror comedies and this low budget example is a wonderful little gem. Sure it can be pretty silly but that's always intentional and always funny enough to be worth it. The comedy also relies on the tension, producing that wonderful blend of laughter and creepiness that makes me love this genre so much.
Our protagonist wants to be an artist so much he goes to unethical lengths, but he seems to struggle to understand the world around him. There's a sense of innocence to him. Like perhaps he doesn't understand what he's doing and, perhaps more realistically, lies to himself in order not to feel guilty about the positive attention he receives.
I'm sure anyone who has not seen the film yet is getting confused by this point, but trust me, this is one you will not regret checking out.
B+
Educating Rita (1983)
Best thing: Michael Caine and Julie Walters are two incredible performers so seeing them acting alongside one another is almost enough to recommend this by itself. However, I really love the way this handles ideas of class. Both the characters have somewhat misguided understandings of class boundaries, but their respective journeys both reveal the deeper complexities and subtleties of class division. I've long struggled to understand how class works. Having come from a middle class background and left university to find myself stuck in fairly low wage positions, class has always felt like an odd concept for me to come to terms with. But I feel like Educating Rita really helped me understand class divisions better (as they stood in the 80s at least).
Worst thing: The synthy music is terrible. At certain points where it starts up that music is startlingly offputting. That the director felt it made sense to include music like that really dates this film more than anything else.
Julie Walters’ character believes that learning how to write academic English essays will make her higher class. Her boyfriend just wants her to marry him and have his children. Michael Caine is fascinated by her because she is so unlike his students writing identical essays about classic literature and he feels like he would actually be tainting her if he taught her how to churn out the same kinds of essays rather than enjoying literature for its own sake.
Funny, charming, fascinating and deceptively simple.
A+