The language makes the play.

Rating: 8/10 (1 February 2012)

I couldn't disagree more with the review that slates Shakespeare's text as 'too wordy for modern audiences'. Viewers may find it challenging, but even those who haven't read his work should appreciate his superb capacity for character, metaphor and sheer innovation. To reduce the play to just the plot with some poor, clichéd and genuinely meaningless Hollywood script is to deprive it of its value, and to do a great disservice to its literary status. The responsibility for understanding the language (which I staunchly believe has a timeless relevance), lies with those who struggle to do so, not with the text itself. I cannot disagree strongly enough with the implication that we should dumb-down Shakespeare.