"Shakespeare In Love" - SPOILER ALERT

Happy Valentine's Day!💝

For this day when we recognize love and all the complexities that accompany it, I want to review what has become my second favorite movie of all time (the first being "Pride and Prejudice"). Period dramas have emerged as my clear favorite movie genre and "Shakespeare in Love" certainly falls into that category. Period dramas seem to have a certain kind of charm about them that contemporary movies often lack in my opinion. That's not to say that contemporary movies are bad; there are many of them that I love. Take the Marvel movies, for example. I wouldn't call those "charming" overall, but they are good movies. It's just that I find comfort in period dramas. As a disabled person, I likely would have struggled a great deal in those historical periods of time, and yet I find myself finding wanting to escape to them. It's a paradox I can't quite put my finger on. "Shakespeare in Love" takes place in a time period that I have not delved deeply into, but I've come to love this movie as much as those that take place in the 1800s.

When I first watched "Shakespeare in Love" several years ago, I thought it was a good movie. However, I didn't fully grasp at that time just how good it is. The second time I watched it was last week and I began to realize it truly is a work of art, much like Shakespeare's poetry. The third and final time I watched it was just a few days later. It was then that I fully recognized it for the masterpiece that it is.

I have to admit, it took some getting used to, to see (and hear) Gwyneth Paltrow in the roles of Thomas and Viola. She doesn't have a British accent in real life. In one way, that's like casting a non-disabled person in a disabled character's role. "Nothing about us without us" is a well-known idea in the disabled community. However, the idea of casting a non-British speaking actor or actress in the role of someone who does have a British accent isn't as bad for reasons that I won't get into in this post. I'll let people with genuine British accents be the true judges of how well she pulled it off, but speaking only from my perspective as a person who doesn't have a British accent, I thought she pulled it off well and ultimately, it was believable. 

 

Also, I'm used to seeing her in The Avengers movies as Tony Stark's girlfriend, Pepper. Both roles are strong women, though in very different ways. I was a little surprised at first that Viola left William. It was an act of strength and courage, though. She was fulfilling her duty. 

I eventually realized the movie might not have been such a masterpiece without Gwyneth Paltrow in that role. Sometimes it's the actors and actresses that make a movie great. In this case, everything fell into place perfectly, including the cast.

Another standout to me was Colin Firth. I met him first as Mr. Darcy in the 1995 BBC version of "Pride and Prejudice", then again in "Bridget Jones's Diary". There was one part in "Shakespeare in Love" when he reminded me of his role as Mr. Darcy in "Pride and Prejudice". It was when the queen called him out after Viola's performance in "Romeo and Juliet". At that moment, even as a villain, he had that Mr. Darcy charm about him. Still, he was believable as "the bad guy" in "Shakespeare". Part of the appeal of being a good actor or actress is being able to play very different roles. That's Colin Firth.

The overall theme in this movie is love and it is handled in a such a complex, yet tender way. After all, that's what love is. It's complex and it's tender, and it must be handled with care. The love scenes are tastefully, poetically, and artistically crafted. How they managed to weave the love story between William and Viola into the story of Romeo and Juliet is itself a work of art. I also enjoyed the bits of comic relief that were worked into the movie. 

 

Another theme in this movie that comes up a few times is that we don't always know how things will turn out; we just know that they will turn out fine. The how is a mystery. Every time this theme comes up in the movie, except in the end, we find out that those events did indeed turn out okay. We know at the end of the movie, Viola leaves William to fulfill her duty. When she tells him it will all be okay and he asks how, she tells him it's a mystery. Based on the fact that every other "mystery" in the movie before that turned out okay, I felt confident in the end assuming that William and Viola will also be okay. Perhaps I cheated a bit, too, though. I am not familiar with "Twelfth Night", so I looked it up to see how it ends. Based on that happy ending, I am going with the assumption that William and Viola get their happy ending as well. 

 

I am a fan of happy endings and that is the only reason "Shakespeare in Love" is not at the very top of my list of favorite movies. We got a happy ending in "Pride and Prejudice". Although my assumption is that William's and Viola's story ends happily eventually, the movie does not really end that way. It left me with a bit of an empty feeling until I processed it and talked myself into believing their story will eventually end happily.   

I say this about very few movies, but I can say it about "Shakespeare in Love". Despite the not-so-happy ending, this is a movie I can see myself watching over and over again for years to come. It's like comfort food for the soul and it's a good reminder that while I may not have all of life's answers, everything will be alright.