Much Ado About Nothing

In the right context, witty banter can be brilliant.  In other cases, it can be extremely annoying.  What makes one use of a snippy comment endearing as opposed to something that forever ruins a character forever?  Context.  No person seems to walk that fine line between clever dialogue and aggravating self-indulgent smugness better than Joss Whedon.

He honed the skill on Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Angel, and Firefly.  I wasn't really a big fan of Dollhouse, but from the few episodes I saw, it tended to slip a bit into smugness but came back up before I moved on.  He did quite well on Avengers, making a group of superheroes also human in how they spoke to each other.

So, what happens when a man who is almost best known for how he has characters talk takes on a project where he gets nothing to do with the dialogue?

You get a remarkably unique movie experience.

So, here's how the story goes.  For some time now, Joss Whedon gets together a whole bunch of his friends on a regular basis to do Shakespeare readings.  They sit around his house, drink, and recite the words from The Bard without any fear of judgement.  After Avengers, Joss concluded that his next great project would be to gather up all those friends and do a production of Much Ado About Nothing, a rather light comedy.  However, he'd have it set in modern day, in black and white.

Watching the movie, it was interesting seeing so many actors I recognized playing new roles opposite each other.  Seeing Amy Acker, Alexis Denisof, Nathan Fillion, Sean Maher, Clark Gregg, Reed Diamond, and so many other actors that appeared in Joss Whedon's works was rather disorienting at first, but they slip into the characters so naturally.  Honestly, the only character I couldn't really see vanish into his role was Nathan Fillion, but I think that's because the role was so perfectly suited for Nathan Fillion.

When you see Amy Acker, however, the brain immediately rejects the other characters you've seen her as (the mousy Fred, the monstrous Illyria, the rather insane Root), because she melds into her new role so well.  The same with Alexis, Clark Gregg, and Sean Maher.  I didn't even recognize Sean Maher until towards the end of the movie, he was so perfectly fitted into his role.  Reed Diamond stood out a little bit, but only because I see Reed Diamond in so many things that my brain just immediately goes "hey, it's that guy!"

I mean, he played the main character's brother in Journeyman.  That's how well I can pick him out of obscure shows.

Now, hearing characters use this modern setting (complete with cell phones and other modern gadgetry) with untouched dialogue from Shakespeare is rather disorienting at first, but the characters deliver it like they've spoken that way their entire lives, and you quickly settle into the flow.  One thing that always bothers me when I hear Shakespeare is when people either try to make it more grandiose or impacting than it needs to be.  These are supposed to be real people talking, so you wouldn't really expect to hear it said with over-exaggerated speech or gestures.

There's a few moments that felt like the plot was rather thin, though I'm not sure if it's because of how it was acted or simply that's how Shakespeare left it.  A moment involving a confession seems rather "well, no point denying it, I did it" without even attempting duplicity.  The primary bad guy's motivation feels rather thin, but then I realized he doesn't really need a lot of characterization, his plot is, in fact, secondary to the primary story which is that of the romance growing between two unlikely people.

With an absolutely gorgeous set (I believe this was filmed at either Joss Whedon's house or the house of a good friend of his, and it's ridiculously beautiful), sharp and extremely clean camera work, and a cast that seems perfectly suited to recite the dialogue as if it's ordinary speech, I think that this might be one of my favorite Shakespeare productions turned to film.

Granted, that puts it up with Kenneth Branagh's production of Hamlet, 10 Things I Hate About You, and The Lion King, which is to say that my tastes vary quite a bit.  However, it's the most faithful modern day telling, much better, in my opinion, than any of the modern Romeo and Juliets or Hamlets.  Joaquin Phoenix talking to a ghost next to a soda machine just fell completely flat for me.

Oh, and then there's the MST3K Hamlet episode which I love for all the wrong reasons.

Where was I?  Oh, right.  I highly recommend everybody who likes a touch of class if their film to give this movie a try.  The story holds up to modern standards (well, almost, there's a small plot involving a twin that feels a bit forced in today's world), but the reactions the characters have to the events around them feel honest and natural, something Keanu Reeves can never accomplish.