All hail Macbeth that shall be king
Macbeth, the Thane of Glamis, receives a prophecy from a trio of witches that one day he will become King of Scotland. Consumed by ambition and spurred to action by his wife, Macbeth murders his king and takes the throne for himself.
Michael Fassbender
Macbeth
Marion Cotillard
Lady Macbeth
Paddy Considine
Banquo
Sean Harris
Macduff
Jack Reynor
Malcolm
Elizabeth Debicki
Lady Macduff
David Thewlis
Duncan
David Hayman
Lennox
Maurice Roëves
Menteith
Ross Anderson
Rosse
James Harkness
Angus
Jack Madigan
Macbeth Child
Frank Madigan
Macbeth Child
Lochlann Harris
Fleance
Kayla Fallon
Young Witch
Lynn Kennedy
Middle-Aged Witch
Seylan Baxter
Older Witch
Amber Rissmann
Child Witch
Scot Greenan
Young Boy Soldier
Hilton McRae
Macdonwald
Director
Justin Kurzel
Writers
William Shakespeare, Michael Lesslie, Jacob Koskoff, Todd Louiso
Fiona Crombie
Production Design
Adam Arkapaw
Director of Photography
Chris Dickens
Editor
Jacqueline Durran
Costume Design
Jed Kurzel
Original Music Composer
Andres Gomez
10/17/2016
The directing and the photography are very good. The use of the color, the smoke and fog and the speed of the camera are very well chosen. Fassbender gives a very good performance, but it swallows everybody else in the movie. What I don't like that much of this version is that Lady Macbeth almost fades away. Her character is not as important as it should be and, in the end, everything is expected and everything becomes a bit boring.
CinemaSerf
4/13/2022
The thing about this play is that it is almost impossible to distil it down to two hours. Like most of Shakespeare's tragedies, there is immense richness in the language; in the pace the story develops; in the nuanced characterisations and in the imagery. Sure, the medium can reduce the need for much of the more descriptive narrative but it still takes time for the plotting and scheming; the menace and the power lust to percolate through. Now this isn't a terrible interpretation. Michael Fassbender is reasonable as the ambitious Thane of Glamis. He is informed by three witches after a battle that his accession to King Duncan's throne is assured, and together with his equally determined wife (Marion Cotillard) he sets about expediting that process. Not everyone believes his feigned innocence though, and that means he has to start removing his detractors - not least Banquo (Paddy Considine) and the late king's son Malcolm (an oddly cast Jack Raynor), and it's at this point that their cunning plan begins to unravel. The film looks great, the soundtrack is eerie and effective and the costumes, scenery and lighting really do help to convey something of the real Scottish environment; but again the absence of many significant plot lines - the caveats with the witches' initial prophecy, for example, rob the storyline of much of it's complex potency. The character of Lady Macbeth is underused as an underpinning motivation for her husband's actions and essentially we are just left with a rather straightforward story of power-hungry murder. It is worth watching, but it is also underwhelming.
