Absolutely Fantastic

A lot of fun.

Entertaining from beginning to end, it maintains the spirit of the franchise while establishing it's own seal with a fun cast

It's a movie as timely as it is provocative and amazingly, for much of its running time, it is weirdly funny.

The Winter's Tale is a romance.Sets (one set )and costumes are very beautiful and fitting.Acting is very good,especially by Anna Calder Marshall as Hermione,Leontes'wrongly accused wife.A very beautiful The Winter's Tale.

This excellent Shakespearean comedy is given a good production here with the BBC. Excellent performances combined with some great direction make this one of the more watchable of the BBC productions.King Leontes of Sicily (Jeremy Kemp) suspects his wife Hermione (Anna Calder-Marshall) of cheating on him with his friend King of Bohemia Polixenes (Robert Stephens) and sets in motion a tragic train of events leading to an improbable but welcome resolution...Jeremy Kemp is excellent as Leontes, and Margaret Tyzack is on fine form as Hermione's friend Paulina. Debbie Farrington plays Perdita, Leontes grown-up daughter and she is well matched with Robin Kermode who plays Floriziel. David Burke is solid as Camillo, and it's interesting to see Scottish actor Rikki Fulton as amiable rogue Autolycus.It's not all good - the bear special effect nearly produced laughter in me and the time span of the story is not played well at all - Camillo is the only who appears to age at all.Still, it's good fun and well-paced despite it's three hour running time.Good stuff.

"The Winter's Tale" is one of the late romances, in which an improbable plot is overcome by authorial magic. Unlikely people go through even more unlikely ordeals and separations, only to be united in healing reconciliation in the last scene. The test is, do you get the shivers down the back when fractured people are made whole again at the end? Here the answer is yes.Director Jane Howell uses a unit set which is unobtrusively effective all the way through. The visuals are in monochromatic white at first, then as the story progresses color is added in increasingly vivid tones. The actors often address themselves directly to the camera in tight closeup, so if you have a large-screen TV, you'll get to know these people real well.Pace is generally good, though we do bog down with the sheep-shearing festival of rustics at the beginning of the second half. Shakespeare's clowns are often annoying, but they can clear the air. I just don't like slowing down for them.Jeremy Kemp is excellent as the angry, paranoid King of the opening scenes. He glares into the camera lens and hisses his lines as the great screen villain he was. However, after the Oracle of Delphi pronounces his suspicions false and his wife innocent, Kemp never finds a way to physicalize his response and emotional transformation. You have to listen carefully to his well-recited lines, because you can't guess from his body what his reactions are.Robert Stephens as Polixenes looks blurry and very much the worse for wear, but gives a detailed and professional performance nonetheless. Margaret Tyzack is formidable as Pauline. It's scandalous that this is her only appearance in the series. Anna Calder-Marshall, Debbie Farrington and David Burke are all superior, and Jeremy Dimmick is probably the best young boy in the whole cycle.The rest of the cast is mostly fine, and many of them pop up again in Jane Howell's "Henry VI" trilogy plus "Richard III," and the "Titus Andronicus." This version of "The Winter's Tale" is good stuff, so don't hesitate.

This is a TERRIBLE film, one of the worst Shakespeare adaptations ever made in the history of the world. It manages to bore FROM THE FIRST FIVE SECONDS, and to watch the entire three hours is an appalling prospect. Made with no imagination at all, and on a budget of 57 pence, it has only one (boring) set, and an array of famous actor giving boring, boring performances. Even the comic pastoral scenes are slow, clumsy and lumpen. Poor Shakespeare. Poor students forced to watch this film. When you die and go to Hell, this will be the in-flight movie.