Othello

So, I don't know if this is breaking copyright laws or anything, but Othello (1995) is on youtube in full:

So of course I watched it!! I have to admit that by now, I probably have like, the teeeensiest little crush on Kenneth Branagh. Especially after seeing 'Much Ado About Nothing.' What? Don't Judge.

And of course he was brilliant again in Othello. All of the acting was really well done, and every line expressed with real feeling. I think the lines were all very close to the original script, and it was very authentic. The costumes were, I suppose, what you would expect of the time and place. The thing I noticed most about costume was that Othello constantly wore a white cape with gold lining, maybe to represent his innocence in the matter; but during the scene in bed when he kills Desdemona and himself, he suddenly switches to black, maybe to represent the evil side of himself.Iago, on the other hand, wears a sort of Robin Hood getup throughout the whole movie. Besides, of course, the end, when he just has his blood-stained white undershirt. Maybe this could show how he puts on this charade through the whole play that he is a good, humble, and honest man. But in the end, you can see clearly the blood on his hands. I noticed this mostly because they don't make it clear exactly how he gets blood on his shirt; there's lots of action, and then it seems to just show up there by the time he is caught. It could have been underneath his jacket the whole time since he killed Roderigo, you never know.

The beginning scene showed gondolas riding across the waters in Venice, and the beginning was full of cool stuff: Desdemona wore a black veil to her secret wedding. Who wears a black veil to their wedding? Hmmm, foreshadowing maybe? I also thought it was pretty cool how Iago and Roderigo were looking in on the wedding, spying on the secret marriage. It makes the beginning lines make a little more sense, as in the text you can't really tell what they were talking about at first. Iago on the outside of the building, claiming that he had no foreknowledge of the events, is a pretty good image too, because it makes you wonder whether Othello and Iago are close enough for Othello to invite him. This could actually be an interpretation of more of Iago's motivation behind his heinous acts: Othello doesn't tell him about something really important to him, but instead invites Cassio as his best man... there could be jealousy for Cassio on another dimension.

I also took note that when Iago was telling Othello about Desdemona's 'unfaithfulness,' Othello flashed back to when her father said, "She has deceived her father, and may thee."
As the play goes on, after the beginning, you can see how close Iago and Othello are, Othello always calling him "honest Iago," and the two spending so much time together. And at the end, when Iago's true acts have been revealed, he and Othello kneel on the floor staring at each other, even when others are addressing them. You can see Othello searching for something in Iago's eyes, and Iago's confliction, maybe between love and hate. Then after Othello kills himself, the stabbed Iago lays himself at Othello's feet, almost like he's paying him respect.

I think seeing this production really helped me see another perspective on the interpretation of Othello and Iago in terms of costuming and acting. I had always seen Iago almost as a robot, just dying to cause all the trouble he possibly can for no reason at all, but this movie displayed him as a more complex villain: conflicted, sorry, evil, loving, and hating all at the same time.