So I just got back from an NT Live screening of Simon Russell Beale's harrowing, thought-provoking Timon of Athens, on which I will, before too long, have a lot to say. This is not, however, that post. Because last night I joined a group of fellow masochists in a group hate-watching of Anonymous, Roland Emmerich's feculent anti-Shakespearean ( Read more... )

Apparently not far enough to take the chance to go see That Movie for free. It is cold and I only had two hours of sleep, which is not enough to cope with all the rage it will no doubt inspire. So I am staying home in my pajamas and watching baseball instead.

So here, enjoy someone else's efforts to tear this film a new one. I'm not sure whether ( Read more... )

Which nobody is going to read because everybody is deleting their livejournals and I will have NO FRIENDS LEFT.

ANYWAY. If you are still out there, a giant backlog of links:

Prince Charles weighs in! He's on the right side.

Skeptical Humanities gives us five reasons and then five more why Roland Emmerich is an idiot. It's a point-by-point ( Read more... )

Because once again she's where I first saw the Stratfordian link of the day: Wouldn't It Be Cool if Shakespeare Wasn't Shakespeare?

Besides, no argument could ever possibly sway the Oxfordian crowd. They are the prophets of truthiness. “It couldn’t have been Shakespeare,” they say. “How could a semiliterate country boy have composed works of such ( Read more... )

Some more links for you all ( Read more... )

So you know how in That Oxford Movie, Oxford is Elizabeth's illegitimate son (although she doesn't realize it and then they have a bemulleted incest baby who is Southampton)? Which would make him Henry VIII's grandson?

Take a look at these two pictures:


( Read more... )

comes from the heroic Holger Syme, who also wrote this now-classic piece of snark (be sure to check out all the tinhats in the comments, including THE SCREENWRITER OF THE MOVIE, whose style would be unprepossessing even to someone whose gorge did not rise at the premise of this film), and is less snark and more of a statement on why this stuff ( Read more... )

Presented without comment:

Click to view

Click to view

Eve (a former colleague of mine!) at Skeptical Humanities comments on the film and its "study guide":

So, no, Anonymous is NOT just a movie: it is a huge propaganda machine that wants desperately to sway viewers and students. Oh, and I know that this is nitpicky, but I don’t get the title. Perhaps I’ll understand after I (cringe) see the damned ( Read more... )

I am afraid you're going to be hearing a lot about it in this space for a while, but it makes me SO MAD and there is such LOVELY SNARK coming out about it.

In the Telegraph, Stanley Wells weighs in:

"How could he have known about Italy?" they ask. From books and conversations with travellers. How could he have known about aristocratic manners and ( Read more... )