Kenneth Branagh

[poliphilo]

We caught the end of The Wild, Wild West over the holiday. It's a damn bad film- an attempt to transfer the peculiar charm of Men in Black to another genre which fails laboriously.  Branagh was in it. He was chopped off at the waist and sitting in a steampunk wheelchair, sporting long black locks and a cod Southern accent. He seemed to be having the time of his life. I winced for him.

I winced for Monument Valley too. After all those John Ford movies to have to appear as a backdrop to this! 

Branagh is a peculiarly wince-making actor. He can be very good and he can be very bad. And when he's being very bad it's not because he's phoning it in, it's because he's having such fun. Much Ado About Nothing was a pretty good movie (Branagh as director is similarly hit and miss) but it had a couple of terrible performances in it. One was Michael Keaton's (what did he think he was doing?) and the other was Branagh's own- hyperactive, stagey and unfunny- and irresistibly reminiscent of the hateful British gameshow host Noel Edmonds.

All though his career Branagh has been dogged- or blessed- by comparisons with Olivier. The comparison holds on many levels- and this is one of them- that they're both mad enthusiasts for their craft- in love with make-up and silly accents and going out on a tightrope over a cage of hungry lions armed only with an umbrella. Olivier once, notoriously, starred in a double-bill of Oedipus Rex and Sheridan's The Critic- the starkest of Greek tragedies and a piece of Georgian fluff.  It was a way of showcasing his virtuosity. He admitted it was vulgar, but what the hell; he was Olivier; he could do as he pleased. Branagh has a similar refusal to recognise boundaries. His four most recent films as director are The Magic Flute, As You Like It, Sleuth and Thor- Shakespeare, Mozart, a remake of a popular movie that starred Olivier (can't get away from him, can we?) and a superhero yarn.

Meanwhile, on TV, he's playing the Swedish policeman Wallender.  Here he's seriously good.  No need to wince, unless it's at the Bergmanesque horror of it all. Wallender is an obsessive: when he's on one of his cases- all of which he takes so very personally- he doesn't eat, he doesn't sleep, he doesn't shave. Branagh underplays him- but unlike Olivier- who had ways of signalling to the camera that he was underplaying and we should admire him for it-  does it without actorly tricks. 

There are some actors who never turn in a bad performance. Everything around them may be turning to dust but they stand firm. Michael Caine comes to mind- Bill Nighy, Imelda Staunton. That's what makes them great-  that they're reliable. You hire them and they'll give you quality every time. And then there are the loonies- and they're much rarer. Olivier made an ass of himself almost as often as he took the stage by storm, but it was that willingness to go where angels fear to tread that made him- unassailably- the head of his profession. And now there's Branagh. He does mad things. It was mad to go head to head with Olivier over Henry V, mad to film the full text of Hamlet, mad to play the steam punk villain in Wild Wild West with such reckless abandon. The head of his profession? No, acting doesn't have that kind of structured hierarchy any more; then you played Hamlet in the West End and you were king; now there are far too many platforms to shine on for one man to dominate them all- but certainly special, cherishable- a rare talent, bordering on genius. And he's only 50.  His Lear is still to come and also- no doubt- all manner of other brilliant, masterful, wince-making and totally bonkers pieces of work. 

Comments

[solar-diablo.livejournal.com]

I enjoyed Branagh's performance in Henry V, and accepted what he did in Much Ado About Nothing because well, it was a comedy, and I've seen enough episodes of Three's Company to expect a certain wackiness when romantic misunderstandings of that sort take place. But I admit I disliked Branagh's Hamlet for reasons similar to why you disliked his Benedick.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

We experienced a lot of Hamlets last year- what with Ailz doing a OU Shakespeare course. She watched almost every version available; I was more picky. And one of the ones I missed out on was Branagh's.

[treehavn.livejournal.com]

I love Wallander. Just one glimpse of Branagh's crumpled, knackered-looking face and you think, Blimey this is a version of him I haven't seen before.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Yes, it's hardly a part you could have imagined him playing when he was a young rip. He's an actor who's always looking to extend his range.

Wallander is very well made. I love those wide open Swedish landscapes, that wintry light.

[daisytells.livejournal.com]

I too am a Wallender fan, but our local PBS channels have aired only three episodes. I want more!
I enjoyed the banter in Much Ado as well.
I agree that there are times when I cannot stand watching Brannagh, but then I have seen a lot of the old Olivier films, watched him chewing the scenery, and wondered what all the fuss was about.

[queen-in-autumn.livejournal.com]

Thank you for this! I love Branagh, and it's soooo painful to watch Branagh when he's doing something like Wild Wild West or (shudder) Frankenstein. I happen to like his Benedict but can't stand his Hamlet. That whole movie was far too pretentious. (Okay, I use it for my icon, but it's a good icon. . . )

Have you seen him in "Conspiracy," in which he plays the architect of the Final Solution? A group of Nazi officials gathers in a country house over the weekend to figure out what to do about the 'problem of the Jews'. He is alternately utterly charming and quietly, ruthlessly deadly. It's wonderful.

I also like his Iago in the movie of Othello with Lawrence Fishburn.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

There were only three episodes in the first season of Wallender. They have now made three more. I expect they'll be coming your way soon.

I believe- because many people have told me so- that Olivier was an electrifying stage performer- the greatest of his generation. I agree that his film performances fail to sustain his reputation. He's at his best in the Shakespeare movies- that is to say at his most theatrical.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I've seen a little bit of Conspiracy- and would like to see it all.

I agree about his Iago.

Like Tim Burton- whom I wrote about yesterday- he's capable of monumental lapses of taste and judgement. He'll try anything- and sometimes he pulls it off. I'm inclined to think- as a general rule- he should steer away from comedy. Like many other people who are not natural comedians he tries too hard to be funny.

[queen-in-autumn.livejournal.com]

I think you're right about that.

His own best moments in comedies are the ones in which he's not trying to be funny.

I think that may also explain just how exruciating it is to watch Michael Keaton in Much Ado and Billy Crystal in Hamlet. . . He lets the pros go off on their silly riffs and doesn't know how to modulate them to make them fit with the rest of the piece.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

This is the drawback of asking your celebrity friends to perform cameos for you. Keaton and Crystal were doing Branagh a favour- so he couldn't direct them too savagely.

Keaton's turn in Much Ado leaves me speechless. It bears no relation to the character Shakespeare wrote, or to any person that ever lived- and it's monstrously unfunny.

[sovay]

Meanwhile, on TV, he's playing the Swedish policeman Wallender.

I just read the first Wallender novel; I've been curious about the adapations. I'm very glad they're good.

Olivier made an ass of himself almost as often as he took the stage by storm, but it was that willingness to go where angels fear to tread that made him- unassailably- the head of his profession.

I read last night an anecdote from Alec Guinness about how he and Olivier once discovered a tunnel in the basement of the Old Vic; Guinness asked where the tunnel went and Olivier said he didn't know, but it must come out somewhere, so come on. They were rescued several hours later, completely lost: it turned out the tunnel went under the Thames. Guinness thought this was a perfect example of Olivier's approach to life and acting. He wished himself that he had been a braver actor.

(While I delighted in seeing him as Hebert Pocket in Great Expectations (1946), which I just saw for the first time.)

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I love Alec Guinness. He had huge range. I'm surprised he considered himself insufficiently brave. I think it was brave of him- for example- to follow Herbert Pocket with Fagin. Also brave to do Star Wars. What he had- that Olivier lacked- was taste and judgement. Olivier's career is full of embarrassing clunkers and misfires, whereas I can't think of anything Guinness did that wasn't in some way worthwhile.

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

I must say I like Branagh's Benedick just fine, and think Keaton's Dogberry brilliant. The really off performance for me is Keanu Reaves who just doesn't have enough vocal expressiveness to pull off Shakespeare.

But Branagh's try anything' approach did really bite him in the ass in casting Jack Lemmon as Marcelus in Hamlet. Dear god it's excruciating watching him batter his way through those lines. I writhe in sympathetic embarassment every time. But then you get Charleton Heston doing an unexpectedly lovely turn as the Player King in the same production, which I never would have guessed would work, and so on balance the ambition pays off.

Thanks for the reminder that I need to hunt up the Wallender show by fair means or foul. I am curious...

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Now you see, I quite liked Keanu as Don John. But then I like Keanu in most things. I've never understood what people have against him.

Charlton Heston was a fine actor, I think, one who fell only a little short of greatness. Not many actors have the bearing to carry off those toga and chainmail roles he made his name with.

[ideealisme.livejournal.com]

Have you ever read Colin Clark's account of the making of "The Prince and the Showgirl" with Olivier and Marilyn Monroe in the main roles. Olivier behaved like a prat and developed an instant dislike to Monroe, who appeared to be either fighting with Arthur Miller or off her tree...but Olivier admitted, once he saw the film, that she shone brighter than any of them.

[daisytells.livejournal.com]

I'm happy to hear that there will be more of Wallender. I dont know if anyone has told you this yet, but the best TV in the USA is from the BBC via Public Boradcasting, and the next best is from Canadian Broadcasting. One would think that American broadcasters would hear the message!

[daisytells.livejournal.com]

I agree with you about Alec Guinness - 100%! Everything was wonderful!

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

There are some very good American shows.

Six Feet Under was tremendous, so was The Wire. I liked Band of Brothers too.

I think the truth is we only get the best of one another's shows. There's a lot of dreary, poorly written, cheaply produced stuff on British TV you'd never dream of importing.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I can't think of a single instance of him falling below the standards he set for himself. I saw him on stage once- in an Alan Bennett play. He had lots of long speeches, which he treated as arias- and his voice, of course, was wonderfully musical.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I can believe it.

I guess The Prince and the Showgirl is a prime example of Olivier recklessly plunging in out of his depth.

[clindau.livejournal.com]

I saw Heston in the West End in "A Man for all Seasons" back in 1987. He was really quite good.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I saw him on stage in The Caine Mutiny Trial. He was smaller than I expected.

But he was a real stage actor. Sometimes film actors are lost on stage. Heston wasn't overwhelming but he knew what he was doing. He had presence.

I once had the rather disconcerting experience of seeing Lauren Bacall in a Tennesseee Williams play. She had a small voice and no charisma and was completely overshadowed by a company of unstarry, run-of-the-mill, English stage actors.