Jason from MNPP here with a look at the first trailer for this our brand new MacBeth movie, which stars Michael Fassbender and Marion Cotillard and yeah you all already knew that. The film already played Cannes and won some auspicious notices there; I do believe some people were upset that Cotillard walked away from the fest once again empty-handed. The film has an October 2nd release date in the UK but still nothing official here in the States. Anyway let's give this thing the ol' "Yes No Maybe So" treatment shall we? (We'll try to pretend for argument's sake that my "YES" can't already be seen from space.)
YES The battle scenes look spectacular right off the bat. We'd already seen some shots from the set that hinted at a righteous visual splendor even before the effect-houses did their work on it and sure enough...
... gorgeousness.
YES Speaking of gorgeousness. Michael Fassbender, ladies and gentlemen. I'm already packing a protest bag to head to LA this winter in case he's once again snubbed nomination-time given the way he delivers some of this well-worn dialogue in this trailer alone. (And that single tear!!! My god.) As a sidenote Fassbender's been working for a long time but I don't think he could've been a star earlier than now - the wear and tear on that mug of his is hypnotic, isn't it? Bless those wrinkles.
YES And the contrast between his battle-scars and Marion's milky-smooth scary beauty, even just as the early visual notes of a disharmony, makes so much sense already. She's gonna make for such a Lady, you guys.
Yes And note how often the two actors are surrounded by a wall of their own sex - masculine faced off against feminine - I can already read the subtexts and themes loud and clear from less than two minutes of footage. Which brings me to Justin Kurzel, the director - have you guys seen Snowtown yet? It's an incredibly difficult film to watch but brilliant, just brilliant. I'd have watched whatever he did after that but a MacBeth movie with these actors is just almost more than I can handle.
Yes Thewlis holla!
YES Thewlis & Fassbender homoeroticism, double holla.
I mean really, with the knife emerging from the frame there. Really.
Yes The costumes look positively scrumptious. Unexpected and singular, even. Jacqueline Durran, who already won an Oscar for Anna Karenina, seems to have done some beautiful dream-like work here.
Maybe So I think what Nat was saying about the Suffragette trailer yesterday, about the absence of a "slate grey dour blue palette" to symbolize seriousness, I think that transfers over here in important moments too. There are unexpected choices color-wise, lots of golds and...
... dear lord this sequence looks spectacular. But there are also some heavily filtered moments where it might be a little too blue-gray and dark brown? We'll see. That's as close to a "Maybe So" as I can get. Back to what matters most...
YES YES YES YES YES YES
So... yeah, I actually don't have any No's. Maybe when they felt the need to say "From the Producers of The King's Speech" - that's the closest to a "No" I can come up with. I'm so sold. Here's the trailer:
What about you?