How do the performers differ from your idea of how the passage is played in your mind? I’m not asking you to evaluate the performance or explain how it should be performed.
I am simply asking you to explain how the performance clarifies a meaning or message of the play that eluded you before you saw the performance.
You may embed images from the movie or other images of Midsummer Night’s Dream as you find them. And you may embed links to references to the play or the movie that you find helpful in reading the text or viewing the movie scene.
With many plays or books being made into movies, it may sometimes be hard to distinguish between right and wrong. Many directors of movies that were once books cut things out or change things up in order to keep the audience excited or to keep thing interesting. However, in the case of the 1935 version of A Midsummer Night's Dream, the director actually added significance to certain parts of the play that made the play overall more enjoyable and easier to understand. Surprisingly, the movie clarified some things that I did not really understand or brought up some things that I did not consider to be important.
The movie brought up how opposite Oberon and Titania actually are. The book never described how opposite they were but it was very apparent in the movie. Titania, encompassed by fairies, looked like someone that had dropped down from the heavens, wearing all white, and always smiling. Oberon, on the other hand, looked like he came straight up from hell, dressed in dark colors and surrounded by goblins. He never smiled and could only be made happy from one thing - obtaining the Indian child.
Oberon and Titania are shown to be very opposite in the movie
The movie also clarified many things that I understand in the book through the background music. As Titania was introduced, there was a sweet, childish song that played in the background as all the fairies pranced along. When Oberon was introduced, there was a very evil-sounding song in the background as he approached Titania and demanded the Indian Boy. Through the movie, I felt all the emotions and laughed at the nasty pranks pulled by Bottom, the horror of the townspeople at the sight of Puck's donkey head, and the uncontrollable lust that Lysander, Titania and Demetrius faced after flower dust was sprinkled on them. The sound really did help express the emotion that the written words had failed to depict.
From the stated above, it can be said that the 1935 version of A Midsummer Night's Dream. I was surprised at how much better I understood the play, even though I barely understood any of the old, funky Shakespearean English. This movie was excellently made, especially for a movie from almost 80 years ago. If movies back then were made as well as A Midsummer Night's Dream, then I have a question - why are movies in this era so bad? Maybe we can learn a thing or two from the past about being a good movie director.
Hello Alex,
ReplyDeleteYour entries on Medea and the French and Italian theater cultures are solid and contain good links. The font, however, is too small. You apparently did an entry on Midsummer Night's Dream, but it is not viewable: the entry shows only a blank square interrupted by a colored line. Fix it and let me know when you have done so,