4/6/02
What time is it? Yep, that's right, it's time for yet another redoing of Shakespeare in a modern setting. This time it's MacBeth set in 1970's Pennsylvania around a fast food resturant. They somehow manage to take a tragedy and turn it into an absurd comedy (while still managing to keep some of the tragedy). The story focuses around Joe 'Mac' McBeth (James LeGros) and his wife Pat (Maura Tierny) who off Norm Duncan(James Rebhorn), the owner of Duncan's fast food, and take over, renaming it to none other than.....drum roll please....McBeth's (complete with golden arches). I actually wonder if the entire movie was based on the fact that someone thought the concept of a fast food joint named McBeth's was funny.
Most of the key parts of the play are there in some form or another. The three witches take the form of hippies who seem to have psychic powers (or are they just stoned?). MacDuff takes the form of Lt. Ernie McDuff(Christopher Walken), the policeman investigating Duncan's murder. For some reason, they make a big deal of him being a vegetarian throughout the movie (either to make him an opposite of McBeth or to make a sequence at the end of the movie where McBeth tries to kill McDuff with a hamburger funny). Instead of at a banquet, you have Banco's ghost appearing to McBeth at the opening of the new Drive-Thru at McBeth's (this is quite visually funny because you have this phantom in really ugly deer hunting clothes very calmly asking why he was murdered). The phantom bloodstain on Lady MacBeth's hand is there in the form of a oil burn on Pat's hand from Duncan being murdered in the fry vat (there are some amusing sequences where she repeatedly tries to get ointment from a puzzled pharmacist for a burn that isn't there). There's even a reference to killing McDuff's family in an argument between McBeth and the psychic hippies, even though it doesn't happen: "Maybe I could kill his entire family...." "Yeah, that would work, like a thousand years ago.".
Overall, I thought the movie was great. The casting was excellent. James LeGros did great, he seems bumbling and taking his wife's orders at the beginning, but growing more cold and calcluating (and crazy) as the seriousness of their crimes sinks in. Maura Tierny pulled off the Lady MacBeth part wonderfully. Christopher Walken was hilarious, he has a perfect comedic deadpan. Who would of thought that he had a talent for comedy at this late stage in his career, coming from such tough guy roles in his past. My only complaint was that it seemed like the movie faltered a little bit towards the end, like they weren't sure where to go with it, but that didn't detract from my overall impression of the movie.
Links- The Official Website
- IMDB entry
- A quick summary of the play, for those of you that need a refresher (like me)
- The play itself.
- Richard III - Ian McKellen's reimagining of the play set in a fascist 1930's England.
- O - Othello goes to high school
- 10 Things I Hate About You - Taming of the Shrew, also in High School
- Hamlet - New York, New York.....
- Romeo + Juliet - Romeo and Juliet on speed
Images courtesy of The Internet Movie Database.