Commentary Writing on
Macbeth (2006)
Macbeth is the shortest surviving
tragedy among the well-known masterpiece of William Shakespeare’s plays. It has
been coming into screen for several times from 1948 to 2015 by the different
production companies yet remains bringing the same core of stories which is
about the ambitions of a man who was eager to become a king.
Macbeth was told by three witches that he was destined to become the kingpin, thus he is egged on by his power hungry wife lady Macbeth to murder his higher King Duncan, and others. Lady Macbeth is plagued by guilt and committed suicide while Macbeth was killed in battle. The movie of Macbeth released in 2006 will become the focus of the analysis in this paper. The movie was directed by Geoffrey Wright and was firstly filmed in Melbourne and Victoria Australia on 21st of September 2006 (Beven, 2007). This 109-minute running time movie was produced by Mushroom Pictures Company with assistance from Palace Films in which Macbeth was the first Shakespeare’s work among their productions of 27-released movies. The movie was casted by Sam Worthington as Macbeth, Gary sweet as Duncan, Victoria Hill which was the screenplay writer performed as Lady Macbeth, and Lacy Hulme as Macduff. Although the core of the stories was typically the same which is about power, spiritual wickedness of the weird witch sisters that tempts Macbeth and the corruptibility of human nature, Macbeth 2006 has successfully brought the idea of how the play is depicted in contemporary setting and broke the stereotyping boundaries in which what became usual in the past era was portrayed in different ways yet being acceptable in societies.
Macbeth was told by three witches that he was destined to become the kingpin, thus he is egged on by his power hungry wife lady Macbeth to murder his higher King Duncan, and others. Lady Macbeth is plagued by guilt and committed suicide while Macbeth was killed in battle. The movie of Macbeth released in 2006 will become the focus of the analysis in this paper. The movie was directed by Geoffrey Wright and was firstly filmed in Melbourne and Victoria Australia on 21st of September 2006 (Beven, 2007). This 109-minute running time movie was produced by Mushroom Pictures Company with assistance from Palace Films in which Macbeth was the first Shakespeare’s work among their productions of 27-released movies. The movie was casted by Sam Worthington as Macbeth, Gary sweet as Duncan, Victoria Hill which was the screenplay writer performed as Lady Macbeth, and Lacy Hulme as Macduff. Although the core of the stories was typically the same which is about power, spiritual wickedness of the weird witch sisters that tempts Macbeth and the corruptibility of human nature, Macbeth 2006 has successfully brought the idea of how the play is depicted in contemporary setting and broke the stereotyping boundaries in which what became usual in the past era was portrayed in different ways yet being acceptable in societies.
The first aspect of stereotype came
into play as it screened in the beginning of the scene. The prior film
productions and even the 2010 one suggested that the move was begun by the
presence of three witches or they called themselves weird sisters who brought
the sense that the power of evil would take a control over the main character
and the witches were depicted as old ugly women. However, in Macbeth 2006, the
depiction of the three witches was displayed in different appearance. The three
witches were beautiful young girls appearing with their school uniform doing
barbaric vandalism in the cemetery and destroying statues. Depicting the witches as ugly like in the
previous movies signifies the ugliness of their souls in a straight forward
manner, but to depict them as physically good-looking as in Macbeth 2006, I
believed it symbolizes that evil is sometimes presented not that here I am evil
person going to destroy one’s life, but as a pleasing person who is promising
the fulfillment of one’s desires. They do not see that evil is more deceptive
in order to infiltrate one’s life, in this case, Macbeth. This notion is in
line with social historian who claims that witches
were not always associated with physical deformity or ugliness. The uppermost
interconnection with social factors seemed to be "begging, grumbling,
cursing and quarreling" (Russel & Alexander, 2007).
While
struggling to keep the original version of the story, Geoffrey Wright attempted
to modify the 4- century old story into contemporary setting to be compatible
with the modern audiences. Changing the character kingpin Duncan from a King
into the Drug Baron, and removing swords or spears to become gunfire seemed
difficult but Wright did it very well. He fitted the original story with the
today’s context. The scene when it showed the way Macbeth killed the Duncan,
however, makes me apathetic. I expect there would be different way when he
killed Duncan yet it stayed true to the original version i.e. killing Duncan by
stabbing him with a knife. I am merely questioning why Wright did not interpret
the act in other way for instance, using a poison or having other people do
that so that it would not invite jeopardies and made the main character feel
guilty. Although using knife as the
medium to stop the breath of his master, the other way to do it is awaited to
reinforce the consistency of bringing into line the contemporary setting. It
seems that Wright wanted to make small modifications in order to keep the
central theme of ambitiousness.
Besides the modern set design and
the costumes sparkling with diamonds and flashy dresses and cool leather jacket
as well as artfully mussed hair, the contemporary setting was showed through
the portrayal of nudity and sexual scenes committed by Macbeth and the three
witches. It is actually not the recent issue but exposing the sexuality content
in the great deal of scenes indicates the voice of the director in which much
vulgarity is not something taboo in today’s area as well as I think it is to
attract modern audiences. It may
probably be in favor that the most eagerly awaited parts of the movie, beside
the mediocre acting and ridiculousness of the plots, is the scenes where the
clothes start coming off (Ori, 2014). As the consequence of
that, this movie is not recommended to be shown for underage students in
conjunction with a study of Shakespeare’s play.
In summary, Macbeth as the masterpiece of
Shakespeare has initiated Geoffrey Wright to build on in his
adaption Macbeth (2006). Shakespeare and Wright explored the
consequences of the evil and ambitious man in different approach of setting
which is classic and contemporary. The successful portrayal of contemporary
setting and how the thing goes in new figure and look are the excellence of
this movie.
References:
Beven,
S. (2007). Macbeth: The Melbourne
Underworld. The present time. [Online]. Retrieved http://wwwmcc.murdoch.edu.au/readingroom/film/dbase/2007/macbeth.html.
Accessed on December 12, 2016/
Ori,
I. (2014). Explicit and Embedded Sexual
Content in horror film. [Online]. Retrieved http://anakfakultasbahasa.blogspot.com.
Accessed on December 12, 2016.
Russel & Alexander. (2007). A History of Witchcraft 2nd edition.
Santa Barbara: Thames & Hudson.
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