Film review: Richard III (1955)

Only 7 films remain unwatched (well, now 6) in our 50 film Criterion set, and Jami picked this one to watch first.  It would have been my last choice, but it turns out pretty entertaining (although, given its extreme length, we watched it over two nights). It's a bit jarring, at first - the colors are very technicolor, and the costumes look more like a Danny Kaye production than (say) the much more realistically grimy first season of Blackadder, but it's all about the fantastic performances.  And what a murderer's row of a cast!  Obviously Olivier (although his Richard is not nearly the caricature that familiarity with Peter Sellers' "Hard Days Night" bit would lead one to believe), but Gielgud!  Richardson!  Claire Bloom!  

And a steady stream of "oh, that guy!" character actors, from Patrick Troughton in a tiny role as Tyrell, to the pairing of Michael "The Celestial Toymaker" Gough and Michael "the chauffeur from Butterflies" Ripper as the two murderers.  

I must confess to being unfamiliar with the play (apart from the opening "Now is the Winter..." monologue and the ending "My kingdom for a horse" scene) and the machinations were a bit bewildering.  And I have to wonder if some parts were severely truncated, as there's a scene before the climactic battle (which is rousingly handled, even if it looks a lot less like Salisbury and a lot more like Southern California) when messengers keep rushing up to Richard with new bulletins to a laughable extreme, but nonetheless the delivery of the lines and the inventive staging 

kept both of us pretty rapt.  Particularly entertaining is when Richard (with the help of Richardson's Buckingham) 

feigns unwillingness to accept the crown and affects to be found praying between two clergymen.  Olivier manages both to play up the comedy while being convincingly evil (and there are chilling moments in the film to pair with the comedic - a standout one is when everyone but Hastings (played by Alec Clunes, who was at the time a leading stage actor) realizes that he's doomed, and moves to the other end of the table from him), 

and this despite his ridiculous getup 

(and very spindly legs in those unforgiving tights).  The man knew how to bring the bard to the masses, that's for sure.