I don't review movies, but I wanted to write out my thoughts on Scotland, PA in full. Scotland, PA is an adaptation of Macbeth set in the 1970's, with Scottish royalty traded in for fast food. Spoilers for both the movie and the original play (both are good, I suggest watching them, the play probably has productions on youtube and the movie is free on pluto), and I'll be speaking as if you already know the play. I'm looking at the movie in two lights: how good it is as just a movie, and how good it is as an adaptation of the play.
Firstly, how well does it stand on its own? I'd say it fairs pretty well. The fast food setting is intriguing enough, especially after "Mac" kills Duncan and buys the restaurant. The progression of the building along with McBeth's rise is nice, especially since the set design of the place is amazing (although I am a sucker for that retro fast food look, so I'm probably biased here). And along with the sets, the clothing is also astounding, with it looking positively 70's and bringing the atmosphere to the front of your mind. The actors do a great job all around as well, I think that all of the main cast gave great performances. McBeth and Lady McBeth are on point in their roles, especially Maura Tierney, she does a spot on performance of Lady "Pat" McBeth, especially with the "damned spot" bits (although I am sad that the line is never actually said). I didn't think that Banquo's character being aloof and generally disconnected would work, but it did for the most part (save for near the end, but I'll get to that). I think that it was good for letting Mac get away with what he does up until he kills Banquo, since the modern setting would make it too hard for him not to notice otherwise. And of course, Christopher Walken is always a treat to watch, and I think that he does a good job portraying McDuff, especially with the detective angle the movie gives him. Gives him a lot more reason to be going after McBeth, and they do a nice job with having him slowly put the pieces together of what actually happened. And along with the actors' performances, the script was excellent. It got the dialogue down pat, especially between Mac and Pat. If I have some complaints, it's about the pacing. The ending feels pretty rushed. The sequence of events after McBeth kills Banquo happens too fast and doesn't give enough time for the characters to react to everything. And speaking of Banquo, why did the writers decide to have him become suspicious of Mac when he says that Mac didn't tell him about his idea of the drive thru? There's no reason to think anything of it, especially not "hm, maybe Mac was the one who killed Duncan, I'll go tell the detective about this", that doesn't make any sense and was off-putting, especially since the next time we see Banquo, he's going hunting with Mac like it didn't happen at all. Overall though, the script was pretty good, these are just a few nitpicks I had with it.
Now for how it does as an adaptation. I think that it's pretty good. Like I said, I think that the characters are mostly good and are represented pretty well in the more modern setting. Having royalty being represented through owning a fast food restaurant is clever and well executed; having the restaurant being a stand in for the castle is obviously done and works well. I think that having the witches appearing as hippies is pretty funny and fitting considering the time period, although I wish that we could've seen McBeth and them interact more; they only really talk twice and only one is shown to the audience. Having Lady McBeth's blood spot become a burn from the fryer that Duncan was killed with and her feeling it burn throughout the movie is genius, even if the conclusion with her suicide was a little underwhelming due to it being sidelined in favor of Mac and McDuff's confrontation. And speaking of weird decisions with a character's death: Banquo! In the original play, Macbeth has Banquo killed pretty early on (I think at the beginning of act 2), but for some reason, Scotland, PA decides to keep his death until almost the end, way after it would have happened in the play, and have it be the final thing to set McDuff onto McBeth's trail. I understand why it was done (see the reason I just said) but it seems a bit weird and definitely could've been written to happen sooner. Not that big of a deal, it just seemed weird to me. That being said and also relating to Banquo, I think that the banquet scene is done pretty well. It would have been really easy to have it be an actual banquet or take place inside of the restaurant to keep in line with the feast thing. Instead it's framed as a ceremony outside of the restaurant, which I think works because it forces the McBeths in front of strangers and gives a little more weight to when Mac sees Banquo's ghost and freaks out, especially since McDuff is now present to see it; I think it works nicely, and helps to make the shifting of when Banquo dies feel a little more justified. Ok time to complain. Malcom was fucking shafted. Instead of being the rightful heir seeking to reclaim his spot from Macbeth, he just kinda vibes while McDuff does everything. It feels like the writers didn't know what to do with him after retooling McDuff but didn't want to exclude him entirely, so now he's just there to be accused of his fathers death at the beginning, then be almost instantly acquitted and then do nothing. It ultimately doesn't make the movie any worse, but it's just a little baffling why they went this route.
Like I've said, I think that Scotland, PA is a pretty good movie and adaptation of a classic play. It's got some odd decisions that I can't fully get behind, but for the most part it's surprisingly faithful to the source material and makes changes that are mostly good and clever. If you're a fan of Shakespeare I'd recommend checking it out, and if you're not a fan of Shakespeare then watch a production of the play to get an understanding of the source material (I recommend the RSC version if you can find it).
Rating: 5/6
Footnote: if you're here reading this, I've got some more stuff in the works. Gonna be doing a streak of music reviews for the holidays like I did last year, and a writing piece in progress that I hope to have out before the new year if I can find the motivation to finish it and ability to get down what I want. Also, thanks for reading what little I actually put out; it helps me feel less lonely :).
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