(Sigh no more - you get no spoiler warnings this time!)1993 was a real mixed bag - we went from comedy (the Bill Murray/Harold Ramis genius piece Groundhog Day; Mike Myers's beat-poet in So I Married An Axe Murderer; the return of our favourite dark family in Addams Family Values; Kevin Kline figuring out the White House in Dave) to historical drama (Liam Neeson saving lives in Schindler's List) to action/suspense (dinos running amok in Jurassic Park; Doctor Richard Kimball running amok in The Fugitive; aliens running amok in Fire In The Sky) to animation (Tim Burton's masterpiece The Nightmare Before Christmas). Enough to make your head spin! But we got a classic piece of romance/comedy/tragedy in one film:
Much Ado About Nothing
Kenneth Branagh once again proves that Shakespeare is all in the delivery - this time he and Emma Thompson are Benedick and Beatrice, the enemies who love each other once their friends steer them right; Robert Sean Leonard and a fresh Kate Beckinsale are Claudio and Hero, the young smitten couple who are wronged (frankly Claudio doesn't deserve Hero anyway); Michael Keaton is the idiotic Dogberry, keeper of the peace; Denzel Washington is Don Pedro, the prince and all-around good guy in charge; and Keanu Reeves is the uni-dimensional Don John, scheming baddie and brother to the prince.
Listening to Branagh and Thompson hurling barbs at each other is an absolute delight, and Keaton brings me to paroxysms of laughter every single time I watch it. If you've never seen a Shakespeare comedy, this is the one for you, find it!
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