A Midsummer Night's Dream

Plot synopsis:
The play consists of four interconnecting plots, connected by a celebration of the wedding of Duke Theseus of Athens and the Amazon queen, Hippolyta, which is set simultaneously in the woodland and in the realm of Fairyland, under the light of the moon.
The play opens with Hermia, who is in love with Lysander, resistant to her father Egeus' demand that she wed Demetrius, whom he has arranged for her to marry. Helena meanwhile pines unrequitedly for Demetrius. Enraged, Egeus invokes an ancient Athenian law before Duke Theseus, whereby a daughter must marry the suitor chosen by her father, or else face death. Theseus offers her another choice: lifelong chastity while worshipping the goddess Artemis as a nun.
Peter Quince and his fellow players Nick Bottom, Francis Flute, Robin Starveling, Tom Snout, and Snug plan to put on a play for the wedding of the Duke and the Queen, "the most lamentable comedy and most cruel death of Pyramus and Thisbe." Quince reads the names of characters and bestows them on the players. Nick Bottom, who is playing the main role of Pyramus, is over-enthusiastic and wants to dominate others by suggesting himself for the characters of Thisbe, the Lion, and Pyramus at the same time. He would also rather be a tyrant and recites some lines of Ercles. Bottom is told by Quince that he would do the Lion so terribly as to frighten the duchess and ladies enough for the Duke and Lords to have the players hanged. Quince ends the meeting with "at the Duke's oak we meet."
In a parallel plot line, Oberon, king of the fairies, and Titania, his queen, have come to the forest outside Athens. Titania tells Oberon that she plans to stay there until she has attended Theseus and Hippolyta's wedding. Oberon and Titania are estranged because Titania refuses to give her Indian changeling to Oberon for use as his "knight" or "henchman," since the child's mother was one of Titania's worshippers. Oberon seeks to punish Titania's disobedience. He calls upon Robin "Puck" Goodfellow, his "shrewd and knavish sprite," to help him concoct a magical juice derived from a flower called "love-in-idleness," which turns from white to purple when struck by Cupid's arrow. When the concoction is applied to the eyelids of a sleeping person, that person, upon waking, falls in love with the first living thing he perceives. He instructs Puck to retrieve the flower with the hope that he might make Titania fall in love with an animal of the forest and thereby shame her into giving up the little Indian boy. He says, "And ere I take this charm from off her sight,/As I can take it with another herb,/I'll make her render up her page to me."
Hermia and Lysander have escaped to the same forest in hopes of eloping. Helena, desperate to reclaim Demetrius's love, tells Demetrius about the plan and he follows them in hopes of killing Lysander. Helena continually makes advances towards Demetrius, promising to love him more than Hermia. However, he rebuffs her with cruel insults against her. Observing this, Oberon orders Puck to spread some of the magical juice from the flower on the eyelids of the young Athenian man. Instead, Puck mistakes Lysander for Demetrius, not having actually seen either before, and administers the juice to the sleeping Lysander. Helena, coming across him, wakes him while attempting to determine whether he is dead or asleep. Upon this happening, Lysander immediately falls in love with Helena. Oberon sees Demetrius still following Hermia and is enraged. When Demetrius goes to sleep, Oberon sends Puck to get Helena while he charms Demetrius' eyes. Upon waking up, he sees Helena. Now, both men are in pursuit of Helena. However, she is convinced that her two suitors are mocking her, as neither loved her originally. Hermia is at a loss to see why her lover has abandoned her, and accuses Helena of stealing Lysander away from her. The four quarrel with each other until Lysander and Demetrius become so enraged that they seek a place to duel to prove whose love for Helena is the greater. Oberon orders Puck to keep Lysander and Demetrius from catching up with one another and to remove the charm from Lysander so Lysander can return to love Hermia, while Demetrius continues to love Helena.
Meanwhile, Quince and his band of six labourers ("rude mechanicals," as they are described by Puck) have arranged to perform their play about Pyramus and Thisbe for Theseus' wedding and venture into the forest, near Titania's bower, for their rehearsal. Bottom is spotted by Puck, who (taking his name to be another word for a jackass) transforms his head into that of a donkey. When Bottom returns for his next lines, the other workmen run screaming in terror: They claim that they are haunted, much to Bottom's confusion. Determined to await his friends, he begins to sing to himself. Titania, having received the love-potion, is awakened by Bottom's singing and immediately falls in love with him. She lavishes him with the attention of her and her fairies, and while she is in this state of devotion, Oberon takes the changeling. Having achieved his goals, Oberon releases Titania, orders Puck to remove the donkey's head from Bottom, and arranges everything so Helena, Hermia, Demetrius and Lysander will all believe they have been dreaming when they awaken. Puck distracts Lysander and Demetrius from fighting over Helena's love by mimicking their voices and leading them apart. Eventually, all four find themselves separately falling asleep in the glade. Once they fall asleep, Puck administers the love potion to Lysander again, claiming all will be well in the morning.
The fairies then disappear, and Theseus and Hippolyta arrive on the scene, during an early morning hunt. They wake the lovers and, since Demetrius no longer loves Hermia, Theseus over-rules Egeus's demands and arranges a group wedding. The lovers decide that the night's events must have been a dream. After they exit, Bottom awakes, and he too decides that he must have experienced a dream "past the wit of man."
In Athens, Theseus, Hippolyta and the lovers watch the six workmen perform Pyramus and Thisbe. The performers are so terrible playing their roles that the guests laugh as if it were meant to be a comedy, and everyone retires to bed. Afterwards, Oberon, Titania, Puck, and other fairies enter, and bless the house and its occupants with good fortune. After all the other characters leave, Puck "restores amends" and suggests that what the audience experienced might just be a dream.

Tags: romantic, fantasy

Review:
Fun to Watch, and Very Good For Its Time.
This very early silent filming of "A Midsummer Night's Dream" works well.
While it's too bad to have to do without Shakespeare's dialogue, the play lends itself well to film, and this one is done with a zest that makes up for the cinematic limitations of the time.
It covers most of the main events in the zany plot, and tells the story pretty well.
Most of the actors are at least adequate, and the young girl playing Puck steals every scene she is in.
The fantasy nature of the play lends itself to special effects, and they have used quite a few in the short running time.
Most of them work well, and while a couple are a bit creaky, there are also a couple of them that are excellent.
Overall, it is a good treatment of one of Shakespeare's most pleasant plays.
It's fun to watch, and for its time deserves praise..
good early Shakespeare.
This version of Shakespeare's play works well with some excellent performances (the girl playing Puck, Julia Swayne-Gordon, Maurice Costello, Florence Turner) and an attempt to pack in all the twists and turns of the plot into a very short time span.
The curio is that Oberon is omitted and Penelope added instead - very odd!
The players are also very funny, particularly the wild looking actor playing Bottom.
Not at all boring and exceptionally good quality visually..
Fall In Love with what You See. I'm becoming convinced that it is extremely difficult to bring Shakespeare to film without doing some major translations, at least using modern notions.
There's just too much invested in the spoken language itself from whence all the stuff flows that is normally associated with the cinematic.I've been looking at several silent treatments.
Naturally enough, they fall flat.
But this one doesn't because it emphasizes the play of the "mechanicals." The abstraction of that play on film, the jumping and gesticulating is along the same lines as ALL the acting of that day, but double.If you were going to try a film, the best plot device is the play within the play (of any of his plays that have this).
And the best abstraction strategy is to just take his existing exaggeration and exaggerate it.It is all a matter of what you are tricked into falling in love with.Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching..
Shakespeare Legitimizes Cinema.
The Vitagraph Company produced at least nine film adaptations of Shakespeare's works during 1908-1909, and they were behind the 1910 "Twelfth Night" also included on the Silent Shakespeare video.
According to historians Roberta E.
Pearson and William Uricchio, thirty-six such one-reel adaptations were made in the US alone from 1908-1913, with still more being imported from Europe ("How Many Times Shall Caesar Bleed in Sport", included in "The Silent Cinema Reader").
Some of the earliest feature-length films were Shakespearian, too, including "Cleopatra", "Richard III" (both 1912) and "Antony and Cleopatra" (Marcantonio e Cleopatra)(1913).
As Pearson and Uricchio, as well as others, have pointed out, these adaptations were an effort by the movie industry to lend cultural legitimacy to its product at a time when the art form still wasn't mainstream and faced threats of public censorship.
Other literary and theatrical sources were adapted in addition to Shakespeare in an effort to win over the haughty.As for this particular film, for what it is, it's not bad.
It's an extremely truncated adaptation, with wordy title cards explaining proceeding action, which was common in early narrative films, especially literary/theatrical ones.
In addition to the title cards, the filmmakers relied on audiences already being familiar with the play, which is another reason so many of these early films are based on popular literature and theatre.
At least, this "A Midsummer Night's Dream" was photographed entirely outdoors, which freed the production from being stagy.
There's also some substitution-splicing and superimpositions for fairy tricks.
It's a rather average film for its time—nothing exceptional.The filmmakers of this one were also responsible for other Shakespearian films, especially J.
Stuart Blackton, who worked on all nine of those Vitagraph films and a few more Shakespeare adaptations apparently made by other companies.
Blackton was a noteworthy film pioneer, who started out working for the Edison Company, was the key founder of Vitagraph and made the early animation film "Humorous Phases of Funny Faces" (1906) and the amusing "Princess Nicotine; or, The Smoke Fairy" (1909), among other pictures..
Confusing..
This adaptation of Shakespeare's play was one of Vitagraph's prestige productions from 1909.
Like all adaptations of the Bard, it's pretty confusing if you don't know the play – and possibly not too clear even if you do.
Vitagraph attempts to keep the viewer up to speed with what's taking place on screen with lengthy titles which don't really help at all.
The film makes good use of real locations – mostly a forest near to the studio, and there is also some reasonably impressive (for the time) trick photography.
The ass's head however is something of a disappointment it has to be said – I've seen better at school plays.
The last third of the film has been lost apparently, but I honestly don't think that will affect your viewing pleasure too much..
First, read the Cliff Notes, then watch this film,....
Unless you are a rabid Shakespeare fan who is very familiar with this play, I strongly recommend that before you watch it you go out and buy some Cliff Notes or Monarch Notes so you'll have some idea about exactly what's happening.
While not as sketchy and confusing as some other early Shakespeare short films (such as KING JOHN (1899) or THE TEMPEST (1908)), this is a very abbreviated version of the play and is awfully confusing and tough to watch.
This doesn't mean that the acting or direction were bad--for 1909 it is pretty good--along with the props and cinematography.
In fact, I really liked the guy who was given a donkey's head by Puck--cute stuff for 1909.
But even if the film had wonderful production values (which it didn't), you just can't do justice to Shakespeare or any play in only 11 minutes!!
My advice is just watch FORBIDDEN PLANET (derrived from THE TEMPEST, believe it or not)..
A Midsummer Night's Dream's cinematic debut a must see thanks to smart editing.
Silent films are a strange object of consideration for the contemporary film critic.
Some of them are classics, pieces of cinematic art which belong among the best films of all time and which must be seen by any serious film buff.
Others are downright dreadful, only valuable as historical objects.
It is in-between these two categories where A Midsummer Night's Dream's cinematic debut belongs.Stage veteran Charles Kent, along with co-director J.
Stuart Blackton, does an adequate job at bringing this legendary piece of dramatic literature to the silver screen for the first time.
The theatre man brought a few of the bard's plays to the silver screen for the first time, with A Midsummer Night's Dream being his second after Anthony and Cleopatra a year earlier.
Being his second adaptation, it doesn't do much in the way of directorial innovation.
However, the editing shows signs of some innovations that were taking place at the time.
An early example of special effects was used to transform Bottom's head into an ass, while the fairies are made to appear and disappear using the same splicing effect.
For this editing innovation and foresight alone, A Midsummer Night's Dream's cinematic debut is worthwhile..
Silent Shakespeare.
Midsummer Night's Dream, A (1909) ** 1/2 (out of 4) Yep, more Shakespeare early style.
The actual "story" never really comes across here and the title cards just make things even more confusing but the interesting thing are all the technical stuff.
Every shot of the film takes place outdoors and all the locations are very nice.
The camera angels are also all set up to perfectly capture the mood of the film.Tempest, The (1908) *** (out of 4) Another Shakespeare adaptation works perfectly well and delivers a very magical feel.
Part of this is due to the dreamlike camera work but the special effects are also quite good for their time.King John (1899) *** (out of 4) 've been told this was the first Shakespeare adaptation and if so it isn't too bad for what it is.
Running just over three minutes this here takes the final pages of the play as King John dies.