Daily Movie Rec 7/5/2023

The Tempest (1979)

"A devil, a born devil, on whose nature nurture could never stick, and on whom my pains, humanely taken, all lost, quite lost, and as with age his body uglier grows, so doth his mind canker."

Directed by: Derek Jarman

Cinematography by: Peter Middleton

Country: United Kingdom

Genre: Fantasy/Drama/Comedy

Plot:

In Jarman's adaptation of the Shakespeare play, an island populated by a sorcerer, his two servants, and his daughter is visited by a handful of waterlogged guests with no idea what they're in for after the sorcerer conjures a storm to sink the ship carrying them. 

Reasons to watch:

Thanks to its ghostly ambiance and painterly style, Jarman's take on the source material is surprisingly cohesive for its post-modern genre fusions and random surges of camp. It's a darkly fantastical medley of atmospheric gothic horror and cartoonish buffoonery, capped with a dreamlike musical number involving dancing sailors and further elevated by committed oddball performances and Jarman's patently theatrical surrealism.

Where to watch:

The Criterion Channel/Tubi/Kanopy