I did listen to it while driving into Alleghany County, where the mountains are turning golden from autumn and I was reminded of the fact that this mountain range was part of the same range that is in Scotland before Pangea split apart.
Maybe I'll give the audio experience a half extra star for atmosphere.
But notable lines that made me perk up for the fact that they are still used in popular culture:
"Sleep no more; Macbeth shall sleep no more."
Also:
"Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and caldron bubble.
Fillet of a fenny snake,
In the caldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt and toe of frog"
And:
"By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes."
And finally:
"The Weird Sisters" just for the Harry Potter fans.
We did the Kurzel Macbeth:
Gorgeous cinematography, stunning sets, great care and attention to details of costumes and hair.
The Weird Sisters. There were three women in the text, but in the film there was a fourth girl and then later an infant. NO IDEA what this is supposed to mean except that Macbeth and Lady Macbeth are slightly unhinged because their child has died (not in the text). The internet is so woo-woo about what it might mean that I don't buy it. Also these Weird Sisters are really hard core. What with all the newt eyes and frog toes, I thought we were going to get something like:
Instead we got this creepy bunch, collecting human blood off of battlefields and at one point having Macbeth drink some.
Missy gave me a bit of perspective on this play about how it was written very much just for King James I of Scotland who had just come into power and was weirdly paranoid about women because he'd been raised to believe his mother was bad. I actually quickly checked whether he ever married (he did) but quickly remembered again that them royals never had straightforward sexual histories or predilections or at the very least were always subject to salacious speculations so no further illumination there.
So this play was written to validate James' righteous views on women in power being forces of evil by unsubtly making them sirens and peons of the devil.
But like...all the witches did were suggest a couple of things with some eerie music and fog rolling and all Lady Macbeth did was suggest once that his ding dong might not be up to par ("to be more than what you were, you would be so much more the man") and he was aflame in multiple ways. Like honestly, maybe it's a teeny tiny bit his fault the way things turned out?
(His face when she was casting aspersions on his manhood.)
Macbeth's form of insanity I recognized instantly. It's the kind we plead for a mass shooter because he got on Qanon (talked to the Weird Sisters) and his father left him (had a child die). It ultimately devolved into a guilty conscience so that's something.
The ending of the movie was the strongest part. It's what earned it the extra 0.5 points. It made me feel bad for them both in the end, first when she died and he found her and then when he died and was left alone in that field. (All that red at the end was visually really effective.)
MacDuff hailing the king somewhat cynically after all that he'd lost and Banquo's kid coming to get Macbeth's sword while Malcolm sat next to his throne, implying that it was going to start all over again was poignant. I felt pain for humanity, then because yes it will happen again and again.
Question for those who may know. What is with the blue makeup? I remember blue war paint in Braveheart too although that may not be the same thing. Also why do they cover the eyes of dead people with stones?
Excellent October read. We timed that well. I may not know what anyone was talking about half the time, but the fogs were billowy and the mountains chilly and I am finally in autumn.
We're doing Richard II next. Our first history! There's a series called the The Hollow Crown that adapted four Shakespeare histories into four episodes. It looks stunning if nothing else.
But notable lines that made me perk up for the fact that they are still used in popular culture:
"Sleep no more; Macbeth shall sleep no more."
Also:
"Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and caldron bubble.
Fillet of a fenny snake,
In the caldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt and toe of frog"
And:
"By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes."
And finally:
"The Weird Sisters" just for the Harry Potter fans.
We did the Kurzel Macbeth:
Gorgeous cinematography, stunning sets, great care and attention to details of costumes and hair.
The Weird Sisters. There were three women in the text, but in the film there was a fourth girl and then later an infant. NO IDEA what this is supposed to mean except that Macbeth and Lady Macbeth are slightly unhinged because their child has died (not in the text). The internet is so woo-woo about what it might mean that I don't buy it. Also these Weird Sisters are really hard core. What with all the newt eyes and frog toes, I thought we were going to get something like:
Instead we got this creepy bunch, collecting human blood off of battlefields and at one point having Macbeth drink some.
Missy gave me a bit of perspective on this play about how it was written very much just for King James I of Scotland who had just come into power and was weirdly paranoid about women because he'd been raised to believe his mother was bad. I actually quickly checked whether he ever married (he did) but quickly remembered again that them royals never had straightforward sexual histories or predilections or at the very least were always subject to salacious speculations so no further illumination there.
So this play was written to validate James' righteous views on women in power being forces of evil by unsubtly making them sirens and peons of the devil.
But like...all the witches did were suggest a couple of things with some eerie music and fog rolling and all Lady Macbeth did was suggest once that his ding dong might not be up to par ("to be more than what you were, you would be so much more the man") and he was aflame in multiple ways. Like honestly, maybe it's a teeny tiny bit his fault the way things turned out?
(His face when she was casting aspersions on his manhood.)
Macbeth's form of insanity I recognized instantly. It's the kind we plead for a mass shooter because he got on Qanon (talked to the Weird Sisters) and his father left him (had a child die). It ultimately devolved into a guilty conscience so that's something.
The ending of the movie was the strongest part. It's what earned it the extra 0.5 points. It made me feel bad for them both in the end, first when she died and he found her and then when he died and was left alone in that field. (All that red at the end was visually really effective.)
MacDuff hailing the king somewhat cynically after all that he'd lost and Banquo's kid coming to get Macbeth's sword while Malcolm sat next to his throne, implying that it was going to start all over again was poignant. I felt pain for humanity, then because yes it will happen again and again.
Question for those who may know. What is with the blue makeup? I remember blue war paint in Braveheart too although that may not be the same thing. Also why do they cover the eyes of dead people with stones?
We're doing Richard II next. Our first history! There's a series called the The Hollow Crown that adapted four Shakespeare histories into four episodes. It looks stunning if nothing else.
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