Directed by Julie Taymor
Clear Blue Sky Productions
On worldwide general release
Rating: 2/4

Titus Andronicus is reputedly Shakespeare's first play, a bloody tale of sacrifice, murder, rape, revenge, and the constant struggle of society to reassert itself as a civilisation rather than a means of subjugation. Titus (played by a grizzly Anthony Hopkins) is a Roman general returning from war with the Goths. He is victorious, but his victory is Pyrrhic in many ways. Before his character is even established he is sacrificing one of his hostages as a means of placating the dead. He is cold and callous, disregarding the cries of Tamora, the hostage's mother and queen of the Goths (played by a Machiavellian Jessica Lange).

What comes to pass is not so much a cycle of revenge as a stereotypic, nagging, gnawing torment as one after another, Titus's own kin are mutilated or slain. Job.like, he stumbles from one barbarism to another, wondering what can come next. What can possibly be worse than this? And then it happens. And it happens again.

Of course, Titus is not like Job, he is not calling on a God to help him. There is no hint of revelation here. All that happens is that a further twist in the plot presents Titus with a compelling opportunity for revenge, and so he takes it. This adaptation of Shakespeare sets his flawed work in fascist Europe, where the set is a mixture of Fellini and Ben Hur. The music is overwhelming, the visual effects a little too clever, and there is little to lessen the theme of unremitting bloodshed. In a time of so many feuds and conflicts it is tempting to think that this work is timely. Sadly, it is probably timeless, a picture of human nature at its nadir.

As the philosopher Simone Weill discerned from Greek tragedies, it is in revenge that subjects give up their freedom. Embarking on retaliation there is nowhere to go but down; the victim becomes the aggressor and is morally neutralised. Only by stepping back from vengeance can individuals or society assert their freedom. Revenge is a reflex; it can become a stereotype.

A closer inspection of Titus shows that he is not really a victim in all this. He is a participant, who experiences the destruction of his family as an assault on his ego. Hence, in the manner of the arch villain in The Usual Suspects, Titus will prefer to kill his own, rather than allow another to do this to him. His children are his possessions; they are not autonomous agents.

If the hand that crafted this play went on to write Hamlet perhaps we should expect even greater things of Quentin Tarantino!