Derek Jarman's retelling of Shakespeare's "The Tempest". I never read the play or saw any version of it so I was a little confused about what was going on. It's something about a man named Prospero who's exiled to an island with his daughter Miranda, a REAL annoying slave and an angel (I think) named Ariel. His brother and the king did it to him (I'm not sure why) so Ariel fixes it that the king's son Ferdinand is shipwrecked on the island, becomes a slave of Prospero and falls in love with Miranda.
This is NOT a faithful retelling of the play. There's plenty of frontal male nudity--actor David Meyer (playing Ferdinand) is introduced completely nude for a lengthy time--and there are strange costumes, noises and settings all mixed with Shakespeare's dialogue! And the wedding has sailors doing a homoerotic dance AND posing afterwards. Then there's a woman all dressed up and lip-syncing (badly) to "Stormy Weather"...I honestly can't say I liked it but the acting is good and it's definitely the strangest Shakespeare adaptation I've ever seen. Jarman did another one like this years later--"Edward II"--which was better than this. Still this is a one of a kind and not without merit.
This is NOT a faithful retelling of the play. There's plenty of frontal male nudity--actor David Meyer (playing Ferdinand) is introduced completely nude for a lengthy time--and there are strange costumes, noises and settings all mixed with Shakespeare's dialogue! And the wedding has sailors doing a homoerotic dance AND posing afterwards. Then there's a woman all dressed up and lip-syncing (badly) to "Stormy Weather"...I honestly can't say I liked it but the acting is good and it's definitely the strangest Shakespeare adaptation I've ever seen. Jarman did another one like this years later--"Edward II"--which was better than this. Still this is a one of a kind and not without merit.