Frame to Frame

A Tale of Coming Home

Fringe ArtsNikola Grozdanovic — Published January 22, 2012

Ralph Fiennes deserves a lot of props. Known across the globe as one of the most serious and best actors around, with highlights including Oscar nominated uber-evil Nazi in Schindler’s List and romantic hero in The English Patient (among a vast number of supporting and leading roles on film and on stage), he has finally taken the route so many actors do these days: going behind the camera to make a film of his own.

He has fused two passions for his debut feature: his love for Shakespeare and his fascination with the ambiguous side of human nature. Doth the outcome becometh worthy? Big time.

Taking the little known and underrated late Shakespearean play Coriolanus, Fiennes modernizes the story a la Richard Loncraine’s Richard III (with Sir Ian McKellen starring as a fascist Richard) and places the setting in an undisclosed city of today, “close to Rome.”

The story follows Caius Martius (Fiennes), a fierce General of the Roman army, beloved by the military and despised by the “commoners.” He helps the Romans capture a city from the Volscians, their hated enemies, returns home and is prestigiously proclaimed “Coriolanus.”

His domineering mother Volumnia (an exemplary Venessa Redgrave) eggis him on to run for consul. When he does, two politicians do their outmost to smear his name publicly because they don’t like what he stands for, and how he goes about his business. Martius flies into a rage until he is banished from his own city, and all of a sudden his number one enemy, the Volscian leader Aufudius (Gerard Butler) looks like his only friend.

The plot is as complex and layered as it sounds, and I didn’t even mention the other major characters such as Martius’ wife (always wonderful Jessica Chastain) or his closest ally Menenius (Brian Cox, a criminally underrated actor proving his worth here). What stands apart from anything else is the acting from every major player.

Admittedly, Redgrave, Finnes and Cox stand a little further from the rest, with Redgrave (at the age of 74) really sinking her teeth into Volumnia and Fiennes showing no signs of weakness in his role while directing himself as the leading man.
Fiennes is utterly captivating and entertaining anytime he is on screen, and one scene in particular featuring Volumnia pleading to her son showcases two titan actors at their best.

As for the story itself, if you slept through you English classes in school and don’t understand a word of the Bard’s poetics, you’ll have some trouble catching up to what characters are saying. But for those who can break into Shakespearean slang at a moments notice will have an enchanting, and very contemporary tale (the man was a bonafide genius after all) of one man’s rise and fall to fame and power. All the major Shakespearean themes are ticked: the danger of power, the greed for glory, the complicated and deep mother and son relationship and even some homoerotic undertones.

At the heart of it, the story is a soldier’s tale of coming back home and how he is treated, and the consequences of that treatment, his devotion to his family vs. his patriotic duty to his country while both seem pitted against his own instincts as a man of war and principles. There’s a lot in here that connects with the state of the world today. Most importantly, Fiennes’ Coriolanus does justice to a forgotten classic and entertains at a maximum level, proving that his filmmaking expertise stretches from the front to the back of the camera lens.
Playing at the AMC Theater now.