The Tragedy of Coriolanus (1984)

What makes it different from others?

It's an amazing and heartbreaking story.

If you like to be scared, if you like to laugh, and if you like to learn a thing or two at the movies, this absolutely cannot be missed.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

This performance of Coriolanus is a miraculous work of art.It is superb from beginning to end but 3 scenes stand out;Coriolanus' farewell to his wife and mother - Coriolanus' first meeting with Aufidius - The death of Coriolanus.In the death scene the Director has ignored Shakespeare's explicit stage directions and introduced some ambiguity. Is Coriolanus saying,"kill" to spur himself on or is he urging Aufidius to kill him? Leaving open the possibility that Coriolanus felt he deserved to die for giving in to pity is a brilliant touch and deepens the sense of tragedy. The cast is extremely impressive. They all had a clear comprehension of the meaning and significance of everything they did and said. They did not merely act but lived their parts.This performance moved me to tears. Shakespeare has never done that to me before. I wish Nietzsche could have seen this performance.Some critics say that The Tragedy of Coriolanus is not as good as Shakespeare's other tragedies because they do not understand Coriolanus' motivations due to the lack of soliloquies from him. I am sure Shakespeare understood that this play would appeal to only a few. Those few would not need soliloquies because they would know that Coriolanus was thinking what they think and suffering what they suffer.Coriolanus is Hamlet in another time and place. Coriolanus and Hamlet are the greatest plays ever written. I have never seen a truly great performance of Hamlet but at least I have now seen a truly great performance of Coriolanus.

"Coriolanus" is a good Shakespeare play, though lack the thematic and character precision of some his better tragedies, most notably "Macbeth" which was also about a soldier.Caius Marcius - later renamed Coriolanus - (Alan Howard) returns to Rome after a proud victory over the Volscian warrior and his nemesis Tullus Aufidius (Mike Gwylim). However his proud disdain for the people of Rome sees him quickly banished by the senators, setting the scene for his downfall that not even the appeals of sympathetic senator (Joss Ackland) or his mother (Irene Worth) can prevent.Howard is quite a presence as Coriolanus, bristling with arrogance and hatred. His performance, though, is a little too theatrical at times. Mike Gwylim is fine as Aufidius and Irene Worth is a fine matronly presence as Volumnia, his mother.It's technically very interesting to watch despite the typically clumsy stage fighting. Corioli and the home of the Volscis are crimson sets, appropriate for a defeated people drenched in blood and anger and the battles are framed well enough in darkly lit backgrounds of smoke and fire. Some scenes could have been trimmed for pacing.Another good entry, and a reasonable enough try at one of Shakespeare's more difficult plays.

Although the BBC Time-Life dramatization of Coriolanus is titled The Tragedy of Coriolanus, there is some opinion that considers the play a comedy, albeit a very dark satire of the consequences of a haughty patrician arrogance. Who is being satirized, of course, is open for discussion, but one suggestion is that the play skews the ill-fated Earl of Essex, a British commander who led a campaign in Ireland and whose overweening ego and hubris led him to the Tower and beheading at the age of 35 after the so-called Essex Rebellion of 1601. Not printed until the First Folio of 1623 and not performed publicly prior until much later, no evidence exists that would support orthodox claims for a date of composition of 1605 to 1608 and the date the play was written is unclear.Shakespeare's primary source for Coriolanus was Plutarch's The Lives of Noble Grecians and Romans, first translated into French by Bishop Jacques Amyot in 1559 and then into English by Thomas North in 1579 and popular enough to reach its third printing in 1603. This enormous work by the Greek philosopher and biographer, among several books purchased by the 19-year-old Edward de Vere in the original Amyot translation (receipts for this purchase still exist), was the principal source for several of Shakespeare's plays, including Antony and Cleopatra, Timon of Athens, and Julius Caesar.Though the author follows Plutarch's account of the life of Coriolanus, Shakespeare expands on the role of Coriolanus' mother Volumnia (Irene Worth), Coriolanus' (Alan Howard) inner turmoil, his wife Virgilia (Joanna McCallum) and on the character of Menenius (Joss Ackland) whose prominence in the play is not matched in Plutarch. The story revolves around a rather obscure Roman soldier from the 5th Century BC named Caius Marcius, whose winning battles against the Volsces, the enemies of Rome. His attack against the city of Corioli, defended by Volsces general Lucius Afidius (Mike Gwilym), leads him to be named Caius Marcius Coriolanus and a triumphant return to Rome. There he is nominated for consul, a term-limited position that requires confirmation by the Senate and by the people.It is soon apparent that recently elected Tribunes will oppose his nomination because of his opposition to plebian representation in the senate. As Coriolanus' disdain for the common people becomes painfully evident, his overbearing pride leads him to be declared a traitor and he is summarily banished from Rome. Returning to Antium, he joins forces with Aufidius, his former enemy, to lead a vengeful assault on Rome, where his wife, mother, and son still reside but, ironically in his most compassionate moment, he is brought down after an eloquent plea by his powerful mother to abandon the campaign.Though most everything about the authorship controversy is speculation, one is forced to wonder how a commoner could (in the totalitarian atmosphere of Elizabethan England) get away with writing a play in which the tragic downfall of an aristocrat is brought about by his disdain for the common people. Though it is true that Shakespeare makes the Plebians unruly and deceitful, he makes class distinctions the center of the story, a rather audacious act, and the disgraced soldier is eventually revered for his nobility.While the play is not on the level of Shakespeare's great tragedies such as Hamlet, Macbeth, and King Lear (there is no inner soul searching or comic relief), the performance by Alan Howard as Coriolanus captures the character's willful arrogance and the production is very well put together, one of the best BBC adaptations. One looks forward to the upcoming film of Coriolanus directed by Ralph Fiennes scheduled to begin shooting in March 2010.

I don't want to be too critical of this, since it is the only available version of this play. Alan Howard does a great job in the title role, making you believe in his character, and all of the other actors do great jobs too. Of course, then there's the problem all of the BBC productions had with this cycle: the production never put in the money to make these plays seem like real films, something Olivier or Brannagh would make, so you get pretty dull sets and very little music, and of course no breathtaking battles or sword fights. Still, that's not the fault of this movie, and like I said, I'm thankful at least one version exists. The DVD comes with subtitles or you can follow along with the text if you're unfamiliar with the play like I was. It's worth checking out if you get the chance.