A politically correct Shakespeare in retirement

Kenneth Branagh’s fascination with William Shakespeare has been well depicted in his films, both directed and acted in, over the past 30 years (Hamlet, Love’s Labour’s Lost, Othello, Henry V, As You Like It, Twelfth Night). And now he has released All Is True (at The Maple Theater and coming in July to WIFF's year-round series), which he both directed and acts in, a kind of summing up of the best-known of all bards, in his years of retirement 1613-1616. The film opens with still, pastoral and lushly photographed images of the countryside around Stratford-upon-Avon. They’re perhaps a bit too static, leading one to think we’re in for a tedious low-key rendition of some story about Will Shakespeare. But prior to that there is a dramatic scene, when we’re told an almost goofy theatrical accident (as often happened in the day) ignited the venerable (and vulnerable) Globe Theater in London and burned it to the ground. Shakespeare was effectively out of work and opted for retirement. The movie continues in a plodding but interesting enough way as Will moves back to his birthplace, Stratford-upon-Avon, and to his rather disconsolate family, who harbors resentment that he abandoned them all those years for a very successful playwright and theatrical career. In reality, we know very little about Shakespeare’s life but we do know – and the film is accurate on these points - that he had three children, one who died at age 11, Hamnet (not Hamlet), and twin Judith and older daughter Susanna. His wife was Anne Hathaway. How much of the rest of the story is accurate is open to question and perhaps there’s a lot of conjecture in this film, written by Ben Elton. Shakespeare (Branagh) is depicted as a soft spoken, diffident man, the opposite of his roaring intellectual genius. As soon as he arrives in Stratford he is put upon by his family. His wife (Judi Dench) won’t sleep with him and his children are sullen at their neglectful father. Shakespeare retreats to his garden and tries to come to terms with the accusations as well as handle tumultuous affairs over his estate. Meanwhile, there are family scandals – Susannah (Lydia Wilson) is accused of adultery against her puritan husband (Hadley Fraser). And Judith (Kathryn Wilder) marries the town carouser (Jack Colgrave Hirst) who has impregnated another woman. But two themes emerge and both have resonance to our modern world. One is feminism - daughter Judith is really the author of poems attributed to the dead Hamnet. And the second is gay politics - Shakespeare apparently had a romantic relationship with the Earl of Southampton (Ian McKellen) who pays him a visit. Add this to the patriarchal neglect of The Bard’s long-suffering wife and family and it all leads one to think that Branagh, in his summing up of Shakespeare’s life, has created a politically correct story for our oh-so-identity-politics-times.