Othello

While a lot of William Shakespeare’s most famous pieces of literature have been re-adapted and cinematically portrayed several times from several different perspectives throughout history, Othello is very rarely within that camp. While everybody has more than likely seen a rendition of Romeo & Juliet, Macbeth, and Hamlet whether it be on screen or on stage, the story of a black military commander falling suspicious of his recently married wife spurned by his viper-tongued compatriot, actually hasn’t been showcased on a mainstream level for some time now in any form or fashion. Within the last century, there were certainly projects inspired by the 1603 tragedy and there were a few lower-budget films starring people like Laurence Olivier, Orsen Welles and Anthony Hopkins (all disturbingly playing the leading role through blackface), but maybe due to said unpleasant history, it hasn’t really ever gotten a second chance in movie form. The last film to traditionally portray the story also just so happens to be the first time they ever allowed a person of color to lead the character as well as the topic of discussion today, that being the 1995 film starring Laurence Fishburne and Kenneth Branagh. Set during an era where the Venetians are battling a war against the Turkish front, a Moor named Othello (played by Laurence Fishburne) is a military commander and has recently been asked to fight against a Turkish invasion on the island of Cyprus. Having just secretly married a Venetian woman named Desdemona (played by Irène Jacob), she decides to accompany him to Cyprus along with his faithful lieutenant, Cassio (played by Nathaniel Parker) and his ensign Iago (played by Kenneth Branagh). Despite looking friendly on the outside, Iago is actually plotting to ruin Othello due to feelings of brewing jealously surrounding his status, and has orchestrated a plan alongside his stooge, Rodrigo (played by Michael Maloney) to convince the general that Desdemona has been unfaithful to her new husband with Cassio. With feelings of suspicion and doubt clouding the once loving man’s mind, Othello falls right into the sociopath’s trap, with the consequence being far too fatal to atone for. This rendition didn’t leave a strong impression like other modern iterations of Shakespeare’s work, becoming a box office bomb despite a very tiny budget of $11 million (it only made $2.8). Despite this, the movie proves to be perfectly capable for what it is as it contains sturdy enough pacing, a decently orchestrated production value and atmosphere, and very good performances.

Probably one of the main reasons as to why Othello never caught on outside of the obvious factor, was that it isn’t one of Shakespeare’s greater stories. While most of his work is often very simplistic by today’s standards and features characters and situations that often feel frustratingly stupid, they work okay because they are run by unfiltered and wild emotion. Each of his classic tragedies are more so stories about people being taken over by an extreme emotion (Romeo & Juliet = extreme lust, Hamlet = extreme vengeance, Macbeth = extreme desire, etc), and this emotion-over-logic manner of presentation against a very bare-bones plotline results in not only the stories being more connectable for what they represent rather than what they say on the surface, but they are left open to interpretation, and can be delivered in wildly different ways and still get across the same message. While Othello follows that trend (this time the motion being extreme jealousy), it’s not a story that has a lot to interpret due to its very clear portrayal of race, and therefore can’t distract people away from its blatantly generic and brief storyline. There isn’t much meat to chew on, and since most of the characters don’t provide much outside of background noise and the plot is incredibly quick to jump from one drastic decision to the other, it goes by without ever being able to come across as a stronger piece of work. The choices these characters make are also so idiotic and it’s hard to feel any form of sympathy for a character who was fooled so easily and took such a vile course of action in response to a lie, it really feels like it would be an uphill battle to portray this story in any shape or form as there are just so many hurdles to jump over. It doesn’t have a lot of insight to add onto its themes outside of the obvious, the cryptically worded dialogue is as usual unnatural in all senses and can on occasion be fun to decipher to learn the true meaning behind this fancily led gibberish, but the overall messaging is so easy-to-spot and understand that the end results aren’t going to be some shocking epiphany, and because it is such a small scale production and has very little cinematic flair, it results in a very mellow production that never manages to illicit any form of dramatic response, it’s a very one-and-done kind of experience. With that said, writer/director Oliver Park (in his directorial debut) does a bland but competent job at leading the film, commanding the actors well, showcasing these pretty generic locations in a decently cinematic manner, and pacing this very minute story in an appropriately quick fashion.

In terms of casting, while nobody outside of Branagh was a huge name yet (Fishburne was still early in his career and wasn’t the star he would grow to be), it doesn’t feel like any of these actors are having trouble working in this story. Shakespeare’s dialogue is incredibly hard to make sound natural (because it is the last thing from natural), so you need people who can not only speak it without laughing, but also do so in a way that makes you believe they understand what they’re saying and fully believe in it, and this movie manages to do that. A lot of attention was put on Kenneth Branagh as Iago in this, and being a Shakespearean actor who has been attached to several other projects previously (with this being one of the first which he also didn’t direct), it feels like he can speak these words without even batting an eye, it feels so weirdly natural to him. With that said, he does still feel a little hammy despite sounding so comfortably casual, and the various times he looks to the camera and speaks directly to the audience, feels like a bleed-over component from the stage play, which instead of sucking people into the experience only serves to take people out of the moment this time around. It also feels like he’s really playing up his monologues in a way that feels a little attention-hungry but given how often he has done these kind of speeches and moments, he’s probably just flexing a little too much. Laurence Fishburne feels like the perfect choice for Othello, not only because he’s actually black (it’s pathetic that it took this long for that to be done in a filmed version of this story), but also because he can capture the dignified, booming nature of a commander, but also that natural roguish quality that makes him feel more fallible, and by extension, more readily open to being deceived. As previously stated, the character isn’t written very well or made to be that sympathetic as anyone who would jump from adoration of a person to murdering them on the flip of a dime, can’t be that good a person, but Fishburne does a great job trying to do so and portrays him in a believable enough manner that it doesn’t feel like an act, it shows what a great talent he is. Most of the other roles are pretty much nothing, but these actors fight for their screen time, and some do make the most of it. Nathaniel Parker as Cassio is appropriately charismatic and his manner of expression is subdued enough that he could be played as either a honourable friend or someone hiding a darker edge (it never comes, but it seems like he could pull it off in a better role), Irène Jacob is fine as Desdemona, but the role is so blandly written and lacking any agency that there’s nothing that can be done to make her really work (she is way too accepting of her husband killing her that it just feels a consequence of the time period and the nature of the story more than anything), Anna Patrick as Desdemona’s lady in waiting feels like such a nothing part, but she does a great job selling all of her scenes (especially during the final segments), and the rest of the cast like Michael Maloney, Nicholas Farrell, and even a very early Michael Sheen, are perfectly fine with very little roles.

Since the movie is so low budget, it doesn’t offer a lot of memorable visuals or eye-catching material. Shakespeare’s work feels like it could very cinematic, with his elaborate monologues and uniquely descriptive metaphors and allusions being prime material to work within fancy locations, unique camera work and experimental deliveries, but considering when the film was made and how they clearly didn’t have an incredibly experienced team working on this film, there was only so much that could be done. The location they shoot in isn’t that interesting of a place, every shot is very tight and doesn’t allow for a lot of establishing shots of the environment so it all feels very cramped, there’s not a lot of unique angles or perspective shots to diversify things up, the lighting stays this one tone of warm orange throughout the whole picture, and while stuff like the location itself and the costuming by Caroline Harris, matches the time period while still being a little theatrical in spirit (Othello is sometimes dressed like the Virgin Mary and it’s a little weird), it isn’t displayed in a very specific or intentionally aware manner, so it doesn’t really stand out that much. Despite this, while the production quality isn’t high, you can feel the filmmakers and the creatives doing everything they can to make it look as nice as possible, and it never feels cheap or lazy. The orange lighting does a decent job bringing a rural softness to the picture, but also a smutty aggression that feeds into the strangely saucy component of the story but also the deceitful portion as well, doing its job at bringing the two halves of this story together without being upfront about it. While the camerawork by David Johnson isn’t elaborate, it is well framed and no shot feels awkwardly positioned or filmed, and the music by Charlie Mole has a timely quality to it with instrumentations that feel right out of Renaissance Italy and helps liven up the slower moments.

Othello may not be as great and entrancing of a story as Romeo & Juliet, Hamlet, and Macbeth, but it deserved its chance in the spotlight, and for what this 1995 version had to work with, it can say that it tried its best and worked with what it had. It’s not the richness, most thought-provoking or even the most interesting to view, but for a smaller picture with recognizable actors and a pleasant enough atmosphere, it does its job and while not improving upon the material, doesn’t degrade it either (it would be a little surprising if it could somehow become even more shallow). It would be nice to see this premise taken in a way that could make it as iconic and reusable as those other stories as well as experiment with its formula and take it to new heights, but until then, this will do just fine.