Cymbeline
1982: Elijah Moshinsky

This is the BBC Shakespeare series version of Cymbeline, and it is inevitably limited by the modest budgetary constraints that limited the whole process. The innate weirdness and incoherence of the play cannot wholly be papered over, either. At the same time, it does carry the emotional weight of the play fairly well, and it features a number of first-rate performances.

Properly conceived, irrespective of the title, I think this is fundamentally Imogen’s story, and the fact that that part is carried by the redoubtable Helen Mirren makes the whole film work, because she was able to achieve the necessary balance of pluck and strength with vulnerability. Cymbeline himself is played by Richard Johnson (whose Shakespeare acting chops were already well established by this point — he was in two of the productions of Antony and Cleopatra, in one of which he plays Antony himself). Belarius, the lovable old man, is played by Michael Gough, whom those of a certain age may remember as Alfred in the 1980s-90s Batman sequence. He’s very competent, and it’s hard not to find him engaging.

This film is not perfect. It’s not clear that the play itself will allow itself to be perfected in performance, because its structure is too undisciplined and problematic. All in all, though, this is a very good version of the play — as good as one is likely to find. It’s not a play that’s done frequently, and to date this version has no worthy cinematic successors. If present trends are much of an indicator, it may not have any for some time to come.

Buy the complete BBC Shakespeare Plays at Amazon. Note that this will require a Region 2 player or a region-free player: it will not play on most normal American DVD players. Nevertheless, the price is so reasonable that even with a region-free player thrown into the deal, you’ll come out ahead.

Buy the complete set of the BBC Shakespeare Plays or individual plays (including this one) in Region 1 format direct from Ambrose Video.