Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Despite beautiful on-site footage in Scotland, this production suffered from unconvincing acting and puzzling alterations to the text. I find Macbeth to be one of Shakespeare's most accessible tragedies, but this version would be difficult to follow for any newcomer to the show. The actors mutter most of the lines in monotone, without reacting to anything that's happening (for example, Macbeth doesn't register any shock at seeing a hallucination of a bloody dagger just before murdering Duncan). The only character who shows any emotion is Macduff, who at least managed to "feel it like a man". Other disappointments--removing the necessary comic relief of the drunken porter, cutting the humanizing dialogue with Macduff's family before they're murdered, mostly eliminating the supernatural aspect of the witches, no "double double toil and trouble"--etc. Another puzzling choice was the attempt to turn some of the soliloquies into dialogue, which really alters Lady Macbeth's relationship with her husband and removes any motivation for her eventual madness. Given that there are so many film versions of Macbeth available on Amazon, I'd highly recommend starting with one of the other ones that do less violence to the text.