Branagh made this around the same time he made Hamlet, and released it just beforehand. It's a movie entirely about directing a production of "Hamlet". He knew his subject, at any rate ... In fact, this film is a good deal better, and certainly more heartfelt, than the "Hamlet" that followed it. It's hard to know why this should be. Branagh is almost invariably brilliant. His previous Shakespeare movies were the best of their kind. I presume it's more or less impossible to care about directing "Hamlet" without caring about "Hamlet" itself. Yet there we have it: Branagh's "Hamlet" is just a tad soulless, while his film about how to perform Hamlet in the face of overwhelming odds is heart-warming, and crackles with energy. (You'll note that there was an omen. The performance we see of "Hamlet" in this movie, although it moves the audience, is dreadful, and belongs to the "let's put Shakespeare's play in any setting but the correct one" school of thought.)
A number of people - including those I saw the film with - complain about this or that cliche. These complaints strike me as being misguided. Is it a cliche to have the production threatened? Maybe; but any movie about people fulfilling a quest would be senseless if there was no danger of them failing to fulfil it. Is it a cliche to have actors fight each other behind the scenes? In a sense; but I fail to see how any but the dullest of films could result if they didn't. In short, these kinds of complaints are complaints against the necessary mechanisms of the play about a play. If they were just they would damn everything in the entire genre. People who make such complaints MAY be saying that in this instance Branagh presented all the necessary elements without verve, or boringly, or something of that kind; but then the charge is just obviously false.
By the way ... I'd like to protest against the use of the inferior title, "A Midwinter's Tale", in Australia (and, I gather, in the USA). "In the Bleak Midwinter" says it better. I trust Branagh himself had nothing to do with the change.
A number of people - including those I saw the film with - complain about this or that cliche. These complaints strike me as being misguided. Is it a cliche to have the production threatened? Maybe; but any movie about people fulfilling a quest would be senseless if there was no danger of them failing to fulfil it. Is it a cliche to have actors fight each other behind the scenes? In a sense; but I fail to see how any but the dullest of films could result if they didn't. In short, these kinds of complaints are complaints against the necessary mechanisms of the play about a play. If they were just they would damn everything in the entire genre. People who make such complaints MAY be saying that in this instance Branagh presented all the necessary elements without verve, or boringly, or something of that kind; but then the charge is just obviously false.
By the way ... I'd like to protest against the use of the inferior title, "A Midwinter's Tale", in Australia (and, I gather, in the USA). "In the Bleak Midwinter" says it better. I trust Branagh himself had nothing to do with the change.