Coriolanus
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Tagline: Nature Teaches Beasts To Know Their Friends
Possibly the smartest decision Ralph Fiennes made when approaching his directing debut was to choose one of William Shakespeare’s lesser-known plays. Can you imagine the hoopla surrounding, say, Hamlet, especially if Fiennes had cast himself as the Prince? But Coriolanus? Even Shakespeare himself might have forgotten he wrote it.
To refresh your memory, this is the one with the political undertones that happens to work wondrously well in 2012. Fiennes did end up getting the part of war hero general Caius Martius Coriolanus — we’re sure he gave a fabulous audition — who is on the verge of becoming leader of the republic. But this being Shakespeare, you just know that his opponents will orchestrate not only his downfall but banishment, which is a two-for-one deal that never goes down well. But by teaming up with former enemy Aufidius (Gerard Butler), a return home is all but assured, a warm reception slightly less so.
The original was set in ancient Rome, and though the name remains the same, we seem to be in a modern-day, war-ravaged Eastern European location (it’s interesting to note that it was filmed in Serbia) and Fiennes utilises the likes of the TV news ticker to update us (and makes you wonder how much fun Shakespeare himself would have had with it, a crass modern-day sonnet, if you will). Directing aside, if Fiennes knows anything, it’s to surround yourself with a solid cast and cinematographer. And it doesn’t get much better than Vanessa Redgrave, Jessica Chastain and Brian Cox in the acting stakes with Barry Ackroyd in charge of the visuals (he shot The Hurt Locker to great effect, a movie Fiennes made a fine cameo in.)
The reviews are pretty much off the charts for a debut. “Having created one brilliant villain with Voldemort in the Harry Potter series, Mr. Fiennes, his head shaved, summons up another by visually evoking the iconography of Marlon Brando’s in Apocalypse Now,” smartly notes the New York Times. “Fiennes brings to scorching life on-screen, spitting out his rage with such force the words seem likely to damage literally as well as figuratively,” said the Los Angeles Times. “Fiennes and his cast yank the 400-year-old dialogue off the page and make it sound vividly conversational; it lives and scalds, sings and singes,” notes TIME’s Richard Corliss.