REVIEW: THE MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR

THE MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR, directed as well as adapted to the screen by Colin Patrick Ryan, is a true-to-text adaptation of Shakespeare's comedy, transplanted to modern-day suburban Oklahoma. I think your mileage may vary, depending on how much of a lover of the Bard's prose you happen to be.

Without going too much into the plot, which is a faithful adaptation of Shakespeare's play, here's a very quick rundown. Essentially, the roguish Sir John Falstaff (Walter Shatley) tries two seduce to wealthy married women in the suburban land of Windsor, Oklahoma, Mistress Ford (Lia Katherine Ryan) and Mistress Page (Lydia Gray) to gain their husbands' money...and hijinks ensue.

Again, say what you will about Shakespearean adaptations, you either love 'em or you don't, but this one was very well handled. The casting was perfect, the performances landed well, technically the film looked great, and the score was superb.

But (there's always a but, ain't there?) while it was ambitious to go with a direct, true to the page adaptation, does it work? I think the answer is yes and no. Again, it really depends on how much you love the source material. I think Shakespeare fanatics will eat it up, but I feel like lesser fans of Old Willy's work might be put off by the archaic language and pacing.

I think that's the trouble with a spot-on adaptation, a changed setting notwithstanding, you're just kind of following the path. Say what you will about THE WALKING DEAD show as an adaptation of the comics, it definitely threw some curveballs at you. Maybe too many. Now, I'm not comparing Kirkman to Shakespeare (or am I?) But I think MERRY WIVES could have benefitted from a slightly looser adaptation.

Either way, this film was very impressively executed, even more so when you learn that it was the debut feature film for director Ryan. This was a somewhat difficult genre piece to pull off, and he handled with the ease of an old pro. I am extremely curious to see what else he has to offer up for future productions!