Reviews

This version of Lear was made for television, and it shows. The scale is small, the sets cheap, the action cramped. However, Olivier's acting is something to be remembered. Lear comes across very convincingly as a pathetic, deteriorating, crumbling old man, weak and defenseless in spite of an unseen past of terrible power and - presumably - ferocious cruelty. Kurosawa's Japanese adaptation plays much more on the terrible past of Lear as counterpoint to the present weakness and madness, this English version leaves the lost power and cruelty only as a hazy background. If this is a defect of Olivier's acting, or whether it faithfully reflects his views on the character, I do not know. But I think Olivier did exactly what he wanted to do, focus on the old Lear, his weakness and his fading away, as a symbol of human nature in general, and of his own advanced age in particular. In the final scenes Lear appears shaven off his beard, showing the naked face of a very ancient man, not the face of an actor at all. There must be a reflection of Olivier's own becoming old and brittle and approaching death, on the deterioration and dying of Lear. And there is the weakest glimmer of hope, both for the character and for the actor, as dying Lear recovers lost love in the midst of destruction.

Of the rest of the cast, the best characters in my opinion are Goneril and Regan, perhaps a little overplayed but very convincingly so, as the hard hearted, scheming sisters. The fool and poor Tom somehow are not quite convincing. Gloucester is moving but a little dumb. Kent is handsome and masculine. Cordelia is pretty. But no question, this is Lord Olivier's show.

The score has justly been criticized as noisy and intrusive. Staging is not always clear enough for comprehension of the plot.

All in all, this movie is well worth seeing. Perhaps there are better interpretations of Lear, perhaps more adjusted to Shakespeare's vision; however, this version has enough merit so as to stand by itself. And Olivier remains the quintessential Shakespearean actor of all times.

This film is first and foremost beautiful. The beauty of the B&W cinematography is appalling. The composition is perfect. The delicate range of grays achieve a silky texture that has an almost tactile feeling. The music by Jarré is beautiful. The child actress Patricia Gozzi is nothing but angelical in her blooming beauty.

The story is simple; a former war pilot with war trauma and amnesia and an abandoned little girl meet by chance and desperately cling to each other so as to find company and salvation. The child becomes the more mature of the couple, the adult goes along innocently and follows her counsel, advancing inexorably to his own destruction. The well intended (well, more or less well intended) adult world does not understand the delicate platonic relation, reads it as sinful and deviant, and proceeds to destroy it. The final scene is one of the most painful and desolate in the history of cinema, even though its beauty is unforgettable.

The weakness of the movie is that it has not survived well the end of the sixties. Its aesthetics is too connected to the conventions of the time. The human relations are not real enough for our time. There is a degree of rigidity, idealization and oversimplification that does not allow the film to stay alive, as is the case with the masterpieces of Fellini and Bergman. However, this does not detract the movie from its serene beauty, its evocative power, and all the nostalgic pain of a lost love.