1. The background setting of the times has changed
The story in Shakespeare's original "Richard III" takes place between 1483-1485, while in Richard Loncrann's film, the time setting is shifted to 1930, Richard III's cunning, cruel, insidious It also precisely reflects the fascism that entered the historical stage at this time.
"Richard III" as a historical drama, although there are also fictional plots, such as Henry VI's widow Margaret died earlier in history before the plot happened, there will be no plot of her cursing Richard. But compared to the original book, the adaptation of the film is a drastic one. This fictional history of the film does not really exist, but it is precisely because of this fiction that the director has a lot of space and freedom to play, without being too demanding about the rationality of time and space.
However, this adaptation also makes some plots look quite comical. At the end of the film Richard and the Earl of Richmond drive their armoured vehicles and shoot each other with machine guns. When Richard's car sinks into a pit, he shouts: "Exchange my kingdom for a horse", if this happens In the original book, Richard was shot down from his horse on the battlefield in the 15th century and shouted the same words. The dramatic tension is far greater than the former. The act of asking for a horse on a modern battlefield where artillery is flying is in itself Laughing is very different from what the original book wants to express. It's more like conforming to the original for the sake of conforming to the original, which is too rigid.
2. The concept of curtain and field has changed
"Richard III" is a movie born out of a drama. There is a concept of scenes and scenes in the drama. For example, there are five scenes in the original book, and each scene will have several scenes, and each scene will take place in a fixed location. Although modern movies also have the concept of scenes, they do not have to strictly follow one scene to complete the whole scene. There are often montages between different scenes. Take Richard's order and the assassination of Clarence by two killers as an example. It takes place in the third and fourth scenes of the first act. Movies, on the other hand, can use editing techniques to quickly cut to the murder in prison, shortly after Richard's order, and then back to Richard's conversation with the others. Compared with the original scenes, the connection is more natural and smooth.
3. Break the fourth wall
A great feature of "Richard III" is Richard's large monologues facing the audience. It is to face the audience with the real face. In each of his monologues, his false self disappeared and his true self appeared. Richard constantly explained his conspiracy and tricks to the audience through monologues, which often resulted in a strong sense of black humor. The characters in the play were deceived by Richard, while the audience offstage was clear about his conspiracy. . Taking the assassination of Clarence as an example, Richard first expressed his regret to Clarence and said that he would definitely be rescued, but when Clarence left, he secretly said that he would " send him to heaven." The movie retains this monologue, and even lets Richard speak his thoughts directly to the camera, which is quite a clever adaptation, just like the ridicule to the audience that often appears in the movie "Deadpool", which makes this insidious and cunning at once. The heart of the villain is exposed in front of the audience, which gives us a unique sense of "God's perspective", to observe how tricky his real self is, and how his fake self pretends to have nothing to do with himself in front of others. This monologue facing the camera breaks the "fourth wall" and allows the audience to face Richard's dark heart. This is a reasonable adaptation based on the original work.
4. Refinement of lines
In the original drama, the characters often have a large number of lines. This is also because the drama is a live art, and the sound expression of its dramatic tension cannot be separated from the layers of the characters' language. However, as the eighth art and as a commercial work, the control of time is extremely important. Therefore, a large number of characters' lines have been deleted from the film, and only important sentences that can affect the direction of the plot are retained. The reduction and omission of , and strive to take into account the unity of language and picture in a shorter period of time.
The above content is based on the existing 1995 film version of "Richard III" compared to the adaptation of Shakespeare's original play, as a film that has won two nominations at the 68th Academy Awards and the Golden Bear at the Berlin International Film Festival. The nominated film, which undeniably breathes modern life into Shakespeare's play through a masterful adaptation. Here I also propose some new adaptation angles on this basis.
1. Enhance the overall logic
We often say that something is "dramatic", which just shows that "drama" itself does not demand logical self-consistency. But since it is going to be adapted into a movie, and it is a movie with an alternate history, we might as well add some new plots to make the plot more reasonable. For example, in the scene where Richard proposes to Annie, his deceased husband's body is by his side, and the murderer is right in front of him. No matter how eloquent he is, it is difficult for ordinary people to be moved or even accept the murderer's wedding ring in just a few paragraphs. . Here you might as well give the characters some time, such as returning home to think, weighing the pros and cons, not accepting that Richard will be harassed or even killed by him, and finally reluctantly accept the reality. This is also in line with what Anne said later in the article and Richard never slept peacefully together. The same goes for the killing of Hastings.
2. Spoken the lines
Perhaps out of reverence for Shakespeare's beautiful words, the actors' lines in the film used a lot of the original sentences in the original text. Although the aesthetics of the words and sentences were retained to the greatest extent, in a non-theater environment, in a relatively life-like film Under the camera, these famous words and phrases appear to be nondescript, as if they insisted on wearing a beautiful top hat on the head of a young man in casual clothes, it is better to wear a peaked cap directly. Also as mentioned above, maybe the background of the story can be switched to the 20th century, but the lines of the 15th century cannot be directly copied to the 20th century.
The above is my analysis of the film adaptation ideas and some new adaptation ideas I have proposed. Criticisms and corrections are welcome.
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