Thoughts on Much Ado About Nothing: Joss Whedon Version
1. OK, I liked their Benedick well enough, but Nathan Fillion would have shown more intensity in the romantic parts, I think. Just sayin'.
2. Though Alexis Denisof gets a couple of things Very Right. You see the moment where he realizes he _can't_ stay neutral after Claudio's betrayal of Hero, where he chooses sides, when Beatrice is giving her "I cannot be a man with wishing, therefore I will die a woman with weeping" bit. There's a little squaring of the shoulders, a little, "OK, I've got to be a man and pick where I'm going to stand, and I pick Beatrice." The confrontation scene with Don Pedro and Claudio follows directly and precisely from that moment. (Too bad they left out the line at the end, "And since thou art like to be my kinsman, live unbruised." I like that line. It's their reconciliation.) Also, the bit at the final wedding, where he asks Beatrice, "Do you not love me?" there's a wonderful wounded-puppy vulnerability in his eyes, only resolved when they both get the love sonnets. He pouts beautifully.
3. Don John is much more subtle and vicious in this version. I like it.
4. And oh, what they've done to his henchmen (henchpeople?)! Yes, Conrade's a woman, and Don John's lover, but that's the least of it - it's Borachio's subtle thing for Hero that gives his part and his motivations a sudden depth that the play could use. Now we understand why he's so eager to break up her marriage to Claudio, why Margaret is willing to go along with him when he asks her to let him call her "Hero" (and we see her motivations, too, when she tells Benedick, "Should I stay belowstairs all my life?"), and why he's so remorseful as to confess himself fully to Leonato afterwards, when he hears his trick cost her life.
5. But that bit in the swimming pool with Claudio just had the Jaws theme going in my head...
6. Amy Acker is a marvelous Beatrice. You can see her love for Benedick making her vulnerable even through the tossed barbs, you can see her feeling of shocked betrayal when she overhears Hero talking about how proud and scornful she is, and how she doesn't deserve Benedick (perhaps a bit of jealousy on Hero's part of her prettier, wittier, showier cousin? But then, who is it again who stands up for Hero in her darkest hour when no one else will?), you can see her utter fury when even Leonato turns on Hero after Claudio and Don Pedro accuse her, and most of all, you can see her realizing, after Benedick agrees to challenge Claudio, that she may just be sending the man she loves to his death, but that it's the only thing in the world she can do to save her cousin. Beatrice is ruthless when it comes to her cousin - she willingly, knowingly, offers up Benedick (with his own cooperation, mind you) for Hero's sake. And yet there's no doubt she loves him. There must be one hell of a bond between the cousins, even if Hero can get a few digs in at her cousin's expense when she has a chance. (The pictures of the pair of them together scattered through the house, including one faint one of them as small children - Beatrice must have been orphaned very young - emphasize this beautifully.) I just wish they'd left in the bit in the beginning where the messenger says, wryly, "I would hold friends with you, good lady," and she responds cheerily, "Do, good friend!" which establishes that her barbs are only for Benedick, with whom she has Issues. And then the next line, too - "You will never run mad (i.e. "catch the Benedick"), niece." "No, not till a hot January!" They should have left those in, as they're important.
7. OK, Nathan Fillion makes an excellent Dogberry. He definitely feels his inferiority, in status and wit, to the more well-off characters, including Conrade and Borachio, and you can see him puffing himself up to compensate. It's beautiful. But I still want to see him as Benedick.
8. Their Don Pedro is far lighter, more casual, and less dignified than Denzel Washington (I don't think Denzel Washington can _do_ undignified...). Not sure I like that - he's the one whose testimony is supposed to give weight to Claudio's, and it's supposed to be a shock and a betrayal when Benedick says, "I must discontinue your company," a reversal between the pair who took love seriously and then shredded it, and the one who never took love seriously and now is willing to die for it. This Don Pedro never seems to take anything seriously for long.
9. Everyone in this movie needs to go to an AA meeting, now. There is a lot of alcohol floating around this movie...
10. Joss Whedon has a GORGEOUS house.