A Midsummer Night's Dream (1999)

This is my favourite Shakespeare story, full of mischief and mayhem, comedy and even a good bit of lust mixed in with the true love. This, however, is a really pedestrian adaptation that doesn't measure (for measure) up at all. The all important character of "Puck" is really quite underplayed by Stanley Tucci and Kevin Klein's "Bottom" comes across better suited for a pantomime performance of this tale of the ultimate love triangle. If you don't know the story: "Hermia" (Anna Friel) is in love with "Lysander" (Dominic West) but her father (Bernard Hill) wants her to marry "Demetrius" (Christian Bale). In the end they have to go before the Duke (David Strathairn) who says either marry as you're bid or prepare to die! Bent on escaping, they all end up in the forest and under a magical spell from "Puck" that throws all of their order into chaos and leaves us with some colourful and entertaining scenarios as the poor old Duke attends to his own impending nuptials whilst unsure of who actually loves whom! The problem with the casting here is that they all seem a little overwhelmed by the language. It does stick to the traditional dialogue, and I couldn't help but wonder if maybe the stars were just too in awe of what they were acting and so nothing really comes across as very natural or engaging to watch. It looks good, there is a fine score mixing the classical with a Simon Boswell original but sadly the comedy doesn't work so well and the whole thing underperforms this magical and whimsical story. Nothing special here, sorry.