Movie review - "MacBeth" (2006) ***

No masterpiece but not as bad as some have said - I think the thing is with this film, people were expecting a masterpiece, and chucked a tantrum when it didn't quite hit the mark. Watching the first half hour or so the film reminded me of a wayward Steve Harmison spell of bowling- obviously done by a man of great talent, but who couldn't quite bring it together, spraying deliveries all over the place... yet you kept watching because when it clicked it would be tremendously effective.

You can see Geoffrey Wright stretching and stretching - occasionally he gets there, some times he doesn't. For instance, the idea of the witches as sexy bad school girls works - their seducing MacBeth is hot - but the actors don't quite 100% pull it off (they are a bit too "play at the Old Fitz" - which is what the film feels like at times, too - I mean, I like plays at the Old Fitz, it's just if this had been done under a million you might have been more forgiving - it probably needed a few more million to really fulfil its ambition). The HD photography looks good -but maybe too good (i.e. too clean and pretty)... which draws attention to the fact it's HD (maybe it should have been a bit dirtier, like Miami Vice.

Sam Worthington isn't bad as MacBeth - he doesn't really make the transition from "I'm not sure I should take over" to "hey I might takeover" to "I'm gonna take over", but then I've never seen any actor play MacBeth do this well; he's got charisma and he's certainly better than Orson Welles or Jon Finch. You just can't help wishing at times Russell Crowe was in the lead. Victoria Hill is excellent as Lady MacBeth, Gazza Sweet is an ideal Duncan, ditto Lachy Hulme as MacDuff and Mick Molloy as a killer (I think Wright lingers a little too long on Molloy's face).

The setting in the Melbourne underworld really works (the whole movie feels very Melbourne - black jackets and skivvies and overcast skies, and everyone looking as though they'd know a lot about coffee). But the biggest problem, I think, in the long run wasn't Wright's fault - MacBeth simply doesn't translate that well to the screen. MacBeth is a greedy prick,his tragedy isn't a real tragedy. It's never really worked on film despite the quality of directors involved (Welles, Polanski) and it doesn't here.