"Prithee, see there! Behold! Look!" (3.4.69)

The Gift or the Denial of Sight in Screen Adaptations of Shakespeare's Macbeth

Authors

Sarah Hatchuel Université de Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne

Keywords:

Film, Macbeth

Abstract

What occurs, aesthetically and ideologically, when Macbeth is appropriated by filmmakers and adapted to the screen? What are the visual strategies chosen in different films using the Shakespearean text? Do they follow the same approach as found in the dramatic material, hiding some events and disclosing others? Or do they choose to impose their own horrible visions on the spectators, confronting them with the dangerous, hallucinatory "Gorgon" evoked by Macduff? This essay will compare key scenes from three screen adaptations of the play — the two renowned Macbeth versions by Orson Welles (1948) and Roman Polanski (1971), and the less renowned 1997 Macbeth by Jeremy Freeston (with Jason Connery and Helen Baxendale in the main parts). By examining the same scenes in the different film versions (in terms of mise-en-scène, viewpoints, camera moves, editing, and sound), this essay will attempt to reveal their distinct visual strategies in relation to three themes: the showing or hiding of "horrible sights"; the cinematic treatment of visions — such as the Ghost or the dagger — which are "present" and "absent" simultaneously; and, finally, the ending of the narrative, either in full-circle closure or in perpetuated suspense.

Author Biography

Sarah Hatchuel, Université de Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne

Sarah Hatchuel lectures in English at the University of Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne and teaches "Shakespeare on Screen" at the University of Paris VII. She received her doctorate in English Studies from the University of Paris IV Sorbonne in 2000 and also has a post-graduate diploma in Film Studies from the University of Paris III Sorbonne-Nouvelle. She is the co-organizer of a series of conferences on the screen adaptations of Shakespeare's plays at the University of Rouen; has published several articles on the aesthetics of Shakespeare on screen; and is the author of A Companion to the Shakespearean Films of Kenneth Branagh (Winnipeg: Blizzard Publishing, 2000) and Shakespeare, from Stage to Screen(Cambridge University Press, 2004).