The Merchant of Venice (2004 film)
Encyclopedia
The Merchant of Venice is a 2004 romantic
drama film
based on Shakespeare's play of the same name
. It is the first full-length sound film
version in English of Shakespeare's play; most other versions are videotape
d productions made for television. There had been a British early sound nine-minute short subject
production of the trial scene in 1927, with Lewis Casson
as Shylock and Sybil Thorndike
(Casson's wife) as Portia.
The 2004 adaptation follows the text very closely, only missing occasional lines. The director, Michael Radford
, believed that Shylock
was Shakespeare's first tragic hero
, who reaches a catastrophe due to his own flaws: thus the film does not show Shylock purely as a villain, but partly also as a victim. It begins with text and a montage of how the Jewish community
is abused by the Christian
population of Venice
. One of the last shots of the film also brings attention to the fact that, as a convert, Shylock would have been cast out of the Jewish community in Venice, no longer allowed to live in the ghetto
.
The film is a co-production between the United States
, the United Kingdom
, Italy
, and Luxembourg
.
in the period, describing the system of the ghetto
and Jewish usury
. Shylock and Antonio are seen among a crowd watching Jews being thrown from the Rialto Bridge
into the canal.
Otherwise, the film follows the plot of Shakespeare's play closely. There are some significant emendations: In Act III, scene I, Tubal tells Shylock that in Genoa
, a person "showed me a ring that he had of your daughter for a monkey." Shylock replies "Thou torturest me, Tubal: It was my turquoise; I had it of Leah when I was a bachelor; I would not have given it for a wilderness of monkeys." Nothing more is said of it. However, in an added scene at the end of the film, there is a close-up shot of the turquoise ring on Jessica's finger, implying that Shylock had jumped to the wrong conclusion.
Another significant emendation is that we don't see that Antonio receives the good news that three of his ships were not stranded and have returned safely after all at the end of the film.
and an average score of 63/100 at Metacritic
. Most critics praised the film's interpretation of the Shylock character by Michael Radford
and Al Pacino
, as well as the dark, realistic look of the streets of Venice, for which production designer
Bruno Rubeo
was honored by the Italian National Syndicate of Film Journalists.
In 2005, the film had a Royal Premiere in the presence of Prince Charles and received a BAFTA nomination for Best Costume Design.
Its worldwide theatrical gross was about $21.3 million, with a production budget of $30 million.
Romance film
Romance films are love stories that focus on passion, emotion, and the affectionate involvement of the main characters and the journey that their love takes through courtship or marriage. Romance films make the love story or the search for love the main plot focus...
drama film
Drama film
A drama film is a film genre that depends mostly on in-depth development of realistic characters dealing with emotional themes. Dramatic themes such as alcoholism, drug addiction, infidelity, moral dilemmas, racial prejudice, religious intolerance, poverty, class divisions, violence against women...
based on Shakespeare's play of the same name
The Merchant of Venice
The Merchant of Venice is a tragic comedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1596 and 1598. Though classified as a comedy in the First Folio and sharing certain aspects with Shakespeare's other romantic comedies, the play is perhaps most remembered for its dramatic...
. It is the first full-length sound film
Sound film
A sound film is a motion picture with synchronized sound, or sound technologically coupled to image, as opposed to a silent film. The first known public exhibition of projected sound films took place in Paris in 1900, but decades would pass before sound motion pictures were made commercially...
version in English of Shakespeare's play; most other versions are videotape
Videotape
A videotape is a recording of images and sounds on to magnetic tape as opposed to film stock or random access digital media. Videotapes are also used for storing scientific or medical data, such as the data produced by an electrocardiogram...
d productions made for television. There had been a British early sound nine-minute short subject
Short subject
A short film is any film not long enough to be considered a feature film. No consensus exists as to where that boundary is drawn: the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences defines a short film as "an original motion picture that has a running time of 40 minutes or less, including all...
production of the trial scene in 1927, with Lewis Casson
Lewis Casson
Sir Lewis Thomas Casson MC was a British actor and theatre director and the husband of Dame Sybil Thorndike.-Early life:...
as Shylock and Sybil Thorndike
Sybil Thorndike
Dame Agnes Sybil Thorndike CH DBE was a British actress.-Early life:She was born in Gainsborough, Lincolnshire to Arthur Thorndike and Agnes Macdonald. Her father was a Canon of Rochester Cathedral...
(Casson's wife) as Portia.
The 2004 adaptation follows the text very closely, only missing occasional lines. The director, Michael Radford
Michael Radford
Michael Radford is an English film director and screenwriter.-Early life and career:Radford was born on 24 February 1946, in New Delhi, India, to a British father and an Austrian Jewish mother. He was educated at Bedford School before attending Worcester College, Oxford...
, believed that Shylock
Shylock
Shylock is a fictional character in Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice.-In the play:In The Merchant of Venice, Shylock is a Jewish moneylender who lends money to his Christian rival, Antonio, setting the security at a pound of Antonio's flesh...
was Shakespeare's first tragic hero
Tragic hero
A tragic hero is the main character in a tragedy. Tragic heroes appear in the dramatic works of Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Seneca, Marlowe, Shakespeare, Webster, Marston, Corneille, Racine, Goethe, Schiller, Kleist, Strindberg, and many other writers.-Aristotle's tragic hero:Aristotle...
, who reaches a catastrophe due to his own flaws: thus the film does not show Shylock purely as a villain, but partly also as a victim. It begins with text and a montage of how the Jewish community
Venetian Ghetto
The Venetian Ghetto was the area of Venice in which Jews were compelled to live under the Venetian Republic. It is from its name in Italian , that the English word "ghetto" is derived: in the Venetian language it was named "ghèto".-Etymology:...
is abused by the Christian
Christian
A Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...
population of Venice
Venice
Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...
. One of the last shots of the film also brings attention to the fact that, as a convert, Shylock would have been cast out of the Jewish community in Venice, no longer allowed to live in the ghetto
Venetian Ghetto
The Venetian Ghetto was the area of Venice in which Jews were compelled to live under the Venetian Republic. It is from its name in Italian , that the English word "ghetto" is derived: in the Venetian language it was named "ghèto".-Etymology:...
.
The film is a co-production between the United States
Cinema of the United States
The cinema of the United States, also known as Hollywood, has had a profound effect on cinema across the world since the early 20th century. Its history is sometimes separated into four main periods: the silent film era, classical Hollywood cinema, New Hollywood, and the contemporary period...
, the United Kingdom
Cinema of the United Kingdom
The United Kingdom has had a major influence on modern cinema. The first moving pictures developed on celluloid film were made in Hyde Park, London in 1889 by William Friese Greene, a British inventor, who patented the process in 1890. It is generally regarded that the British film industry...
, Italy
Cinema of Italy
The history of Italian cinema began just a few months after the Lumière brothers had patented their Cinematographe, when Pope Leo XIII was filmed for a few seconds in the act of blessing the camera.-Early years:...
, and Luxembourg
Cinema of Luxembourg
The Luxembourg film industry is quite small, but this is unsurprising given that the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg has a population of only about 400,000 people...
.
Plot
The film opens with images of Venetian life in 1596, especially discrimination against the Jews. Words on the screen inform the audience about anti-SemitismAnti-Semitism
Antisemitism is suspicion of, hatred toward, or discrimination against Jews for reasons connected to their Jewish heritage. According to a 2005 U.S...
in the period, describing the system of the ghetto
Ghetto
A ghetto is a section of a city predominantly occupied by a group who live there, especially because of social, economic, or legal issues.The term was originally used in Venice to describe the area where Jews were compelled to live. The term now refers to an overcrowded urban area often associated...
and Jewish usury
Usury
Usury Originally, when the charging of interest was still banned by Christian churches, usury simply meant the charging of interest at any rate . In countries where the charging of interest became acceptable, the term came to be used for interest above the rate allowed by law...
. Shylock and Antonio are seen among a crowd watching Jews being thrown from the Rialto Bridge
Rialto Bridge
The Rialto Bridge is one of the four bridges spanning the Grand Canal in Venice, Italy. It is the oldest bridge across the canal, and was the dividing line for the districts of San Marco and San Polo.- History :...
into the canal.
Otherwise, the film follows the plot of Shakespeare's play closely. There are some significant emendations: In Act III, scene I, Tubal tells Shylock that in Genoa
Genoa
Genoa |Ligurian]] Zena ; Latin and, archaically, English Genua) is a city and an important seaport in northern Italy, the capital of the Province of Genoa and of the region of Liguria....
, a person "showed me a ring that he had of your daughter for a monkey." Shylock replies "Thou torturest me, Tubal: It was my turquoise; I had it of Leah when I was a bachelor; I would not have given it for a wilderness of monkeys." Nothing more is said of it. However, in an added scene at the end of the film, there is a close-up shot of the turquoise ring on Jessica's finger, implying that Shylock had jumped to the wrong conclusion.
Another significant emendation is that we don't see that Antonio receives the good news that three of his ships were not stranded and have returned safely after all at the end of the film.
Cast
- Al PacinoAl PacinoAlfredo James "Al" Pacino is an American film and stage actor and director. He is famous for playing mobsters, including Michael Corleone in The Godfather trilogy, Tony Montana in Scarface, Alphonse "Big Boy" Caprice in Dick Tracy and Carlito Brigante in Carlito's Way, though he has also appeared...
as Shylock - Jeremy IronsJeremy IronsJeremy John Irons is an English actor. After receiving classical training at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School, Irons began his acting career on stage in 1969, and has since appeared in many London theatre productions including The Winter's Tale, Macbeth, Much Ado About Nothing, The Taming of the...
as AntonioAntonio (Merchant of Venice)Antonio is the title character in Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice. He is a middle-aged bachelor and merchant by trade who has his financial interests tied up in overseas shipments when the play begins. He is kind, generous, honest and confident, and is loved and revered by all the Christians... - Joseph FiennesJoseph FiennesJoseph Fiennes is an English film and stage actor. He is perhaps best known for his portrayals of William Shakespeare in Shakespeare in Love, Sir Robert Dudley in Elizabeth, Commisar Danilov in Enemy at the Gates, Martin Luther in Luther, Merlin in Camelot, and his portrayal of Mark Benford in the...
as Bassanio - Lynn CollinsLynn CollinsViola Lynn Collins , better known as Lynn Collins, is an American actress. She is best known for her role as Kayla Silverfox in the live-action film X-Men Origins: Wolverine.-Life and career:...
as PortiaPortia (Merchant of Venice)Portia is the heroine of William Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice. A rich, beautiful, and intelligent heiress, she is bound by the lottery set forth in her father's will, which gives potential suitors the chance to choose between three caskets composed of gold, silver and lead... - Zuleikha RobinsonZuleikha RobinsonZuleikha Robinson is an English actress, raised in Thailand and Malaysia by a Burmese-Indian mother and an English father. She is a graduate of the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in Los Angeles, and best known for playing Ilana in the ABC show Lost.In 2006, she played a Bengali character called...
as Jessica - Kris MarshallKris MarshallKristopher "Kris" Marshall is an English actor, best known for his role as Nick Harper in My Family, and as Adam in the adverts for BT Group since 2005.-Career:...
as Gratiano - Charlie CoxCharlie CoxCharlie Cox is an English actor.-Life and career:Cox, the youngest of five children, was born in London, England and raised in East Sussex, the son of Trisha and Andrew, who is a publisher...
as Lorenzo - Heather GoldenhershHeather GoldenhershHeather Goldenhersh is an award-winning American actress. She has appeared on Broadway, on television, and in feature films....
as Nerissa - Mackenzie CrookMackenzie CrookPaul Mackenzie Crook is a British actor and comedian. He is best known for playing Gareth Keenan in The Office and Ragetti in the Pirates of the Caribbean films.-Life and career:...
as Launcelot Gobbo - John SessionsJohn SessionsJohn Gibb Marshall , better known by the stage name John Sessions, is a Scottish actor and comedian. He is known for comedy improvisation in television shows such as Whose Line Is It Anyway?; as a panellist on QI; and as a character actor in numerous films, both in the UK and in Hollywood.-Early...
as Salerio - Gregor FisherGregor FisherGregor Fisher is a Scottish comedian and actor.-Early life:Fisher was born in Glasgow and following the death of his parents was brought up in Edinburgh, Langholm and Neilston and attended Barrhead High School...
as Solanio - Ron CookRon CookRon Cook is an English actor who has been active in the theatre, film and television since the 1970s. He is from South Shields, Co Durham, England and is a graduate of Rose Bruford College.- Stage appearances :...
as Old Gobbo - Allan CordunerAllan CordunerAllan Corduner is an English actor.-Early life:Corduner grew up in a secular Jewish home in North London with his mother, father and a younger brother. His mother had escaped to England from Nazi Germany with her family in 1938...
as Tubal - Anton RodgersAnton RodgersAnton Rodgers was an English actor and occasional director. He performed on stage, in film and in television dramas and sitcoms.-Life and career:...
as The Duke - David HarewoodDavid HarewoodDavid Harewood is a British actor.-Biography:David Harewood was born and grew up in the Small Heath area of Birmingham, England, where he attended St. Benedict's Junior School and Washwood Heath Comprehensive School. As a schoolboy, he excelled at all sports—from sprinting to basketball to rugby...
as Prince of Morocco - Jules Werner as Franciscan Friar
Reactions
The Merchant of Venice received generally positive reviews, with a favorable rating of 73% at Rotten TomatoesRotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...
and an average score of 63/100 at Metacritic
Metacritic
Metacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,...
. Most critics praised the film's interpretation of the Shylock character by Michael Radford
Michael Radford
Michael Radford is an English film director and screenwriter.-Early life and career:Radford was born on 24 February 1946, in New Delhi, India, to a British father and an Austrian Jewish mother. He was educated at Bedford School before attending Worcester College, Oxford...
and Al Pacino
Al Pacino
Alfredo James "Al" Pacino is an American film and stage actor and director. He is famous for playing mobsters, including Michael Corleone in The Godfather trilogy, Tony Montana in Scarface, Alphonse "Big Boy" Caprice in Dick Tracy and Carlito Brigante in Carlito's Way, though he has also appeared...
, as well as the dark, realistic look of the streets of Venice, for which production designer
Production designer
In film and television, a production designer is the person responsible for the overall look of a filmed event such as films, TV programs, music videos or adverts. Production designers have one of the key creative roles in the creation of motion pictures and television. Working directly with the...
Bruno Rubeo
Bruno Rubeo
Bruno Rubeo was a production designer, known for his multiple collaborations with directors Oliver Stone and Taylor Hackford....
was honored by the Italian National Syndicate of Film Journalists.
In 2005, the film had a Royal Premiere in the presence of Prince Charles and received a BAFTA nomination for Best Costume Design.
Its worldwide theatrical gross was about $21.3 million, with a production budget of $30 million.
External links
- Interview with director Michael Radford, and actors Al Pacino & Jeremy Irons on Charlie RoseCharlie Rose (talk show)Charlie Rose is an American television interview show, with Charlie Rose as executive producer, executive editor, and host. The show is syndicated...