SimonJack All playwrights are confined to the physical restrictions of the stage to bring their works to life. But, surely, in dreaming up their stories, their imaginations are not so constricted. If William Shakespeare had lived to see this movie in 1935, I think he would have said that Max Reinhardt had captured "A Midsummer Night's Dream" on film – just as he had imagined it when penning the play in the 16th century. Indeed, the technical and production achievements in this film -- from the early years of talking movies, are so great that no one has ever made another movie of the story to rival it. And, there have been more than 40 silver screen and TV productions of "A Midsummer Night's Dream" as of the early 21st century. Shakespeare's comedy fable of romance, love, mythology and early stage life comes alive in this film with lavish sets, marvelous costumes, outstanding special effects and superb cinematography, direction, and editing. Of course, this is to take nothing away from a stellar cast that included some of the best actors and up-and-coming performers of the day. The film won two Oscars, for cinematography and best film editing. It was nominated for best picture and best assistant director. Mickey Rooney is fantastic as Puck, the fairy servant to Oberon. Rooney was just 15 when the movie came out, and had been a child actor since age six – appearing in nearly 100 film shorts and pictures before this time. This was the third film of Olivia de Havilland's debut year in Hollywood, and her portrayal of Hermia put her on the road to star status. Bigger name stars of the time gave superb performances. Dick Powell plays Lysander, James Cagney is Bottom, Joe E. Brown is Flute, Victor Jory is Oberon, Ian Hunter is Theseus, Jean Muir is Helena, Grant Mitchell is Egeus, Anita Louise is Titania, and Frank McHugh is Quince. The quality and technical achievements in this film were so great that it was many years before anyone even tried it again, beyond the stage. The first TV movie rendition came 24 years later -- in 1959, and the next silver screen rendition came out in 1968 – 33 years after this films. This 1935 film is the benchmark for Shakespeare's great comedy on the silver screen. It's one that's not likely ever to be equaled or bettered. The bard's comedy is there in any good stage production, but this film adds the wonderment of fantasy. The audience sees the spectacle in the sky with fairies that fly. And nowhere is there a wire to be seen or a support revealed. It's as much fun watching this film for the technical and "magical" aspects as for the story itself.The 2007 Warner Brothers DVD of this film has a "Vintage Featurette" short that IMDb doesn't have in its vast array of all things film and video. "A Dream Comes True – The Making of a Classical Motion Picture" is a Vitaphone short of 1935 that runs seven minutes. It has scenes of celebs attending the Hollywood premiere of "A Midsummer Night's Dream," and background on the making of the movie. To build the giant forest on a huge sound stage, studio technicians roamed the countryside for trees of unusual shapes. They added waterfalls and rivulets for reality, and brought in birds and animals. The short runs through the casting selection of 20 prominent actors cast in lead roles. Rex Reinhardt, the renowned stage producer and director had put the play on in the Hollywood Bowl the year before. It was a huge success, and Warner Brothers signed him to produce and direct the movie. Reinhardt brought Wolfgang Korngold from Vienna to arrange the music by Felix Mendelssohn for the film. The electricity for the lighting needed to illuminate the huge forest and set was enough to run a small city. It created a great deal of heat on the set, and the cast "melted" under their heavy costumes. The short shows performers cooling off in front of a giant fan, while Dick Powell treats the children fairies to double-scoop ice cream cones.

jakob13 A refurbished 'Midsummer Night's Dream' is now available. A 1935 rendering of Shakespeare's play with the 16 year old Mendelssohn's masterpiece as background music. Austrian born theater impresario Max Reinhardt co directed it with German-born William Dieterle a Hollywood filmmaker. The influence of German expression is noticeable, but it takes nothing away from the Bard's fairy tale. A parade of Hollywood stars and character actors parade across the screen with Shakespeare's meter and line as dialogue. Romantic leads, song and dance men, comedians and what ever you would find in a Studio's rooster of the Golden Age of Hollywood Studios. Victor Jory, Tina Louise, Ross Alexander, the young Olivia DeHavilland (still alive at 97), Dick Powell, Jane Muir. Then there the eternal laughter of Hugh Herbert as Snout, the plastic faced Joe E. Brown as Flute, the eternal harassed backstage guy in musicals Frank McHugh as Quince and a trim Arthur Treacher without much to say. The ensemble turns in a stellar performance. But it's the 13 year old Mickey Rooney as Puck that is a wondrous delight as his name implies. His performance is almost matched by Jimmy Cagney as Bottom the weaver who is transformed in an ass. And then there is the eternal play of night and day, the aerie lightness of the fairies and the dark brooding of the Teutonic nights of Oberon. This is a film that 80 years on doesn't creak, but is a surprise to the unsuspecting eye that comes up this version of 'Midsummer Night's Dream'. The play has been brought to the screen many times over, but no version has and can match the Reinhardt production, a savvy fixture of theater and cinema. It should and deserves to be seen!

dougdoepke It's a maddening movie, hard to get a handle on. On one hand, there's the Anglo world's leading playwrite, Shakespeare, along with the glorious strains of Mendelsohn; on another, there're a bunch of Hollywood contract players who made their bones as gangsters or low comedy relief. Add a wild card of downright ethereal imagination, and you've got a movie like no other. I can see why the two hours and more failed at the box-office. After all, how many movie-goers want Shakespeare with their gun-toting Cagney, even if he does well. Then too, two hours of poetic dialog, along with goofy mugging, can strain more than just the backside. Frankly, I fast-forwarded through some of the mugging passages. But what kept me going were those ethereal passages, especially the early ones. Now ordinarily, I'm not too much on fairies, nymphs or wood sprites. But the sight of those wispy creatures snaking up beams of light and into some nether world is darn near as good as Randolph Scott striding down a lawless street. In fact, it may be even better, certainly more exotic. Whoever staged those unearthly scenes deserves an Oscar of superlative design. Anyhow, I'm in no position to really judge the film since I wouldn't know Shakespeare from Albert Einstein. But I do know that visual imagination doesn't come anymore striking. And if the beams preview a stairway to the Pearly Gates, then count me in, even if I have to put down my beer bottle.

lugonian Opening: "Warner Brothers have the honor to present a Max Reinhardt production of A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM (1935), directed by Max Reinhardt and William Dieterle." For its initial attempt in a cultural production, the studio Warners selected one of the popular works of William Shakespeare that originally premiered around 1595. Rather than the traditional Warner Brothers logo used for its introduction, the credits are superimposed over a dark background with a giant moon, bear trees, glittering of twinkled stars and Erich Wolfgang Korngold's orchestration to the compositional works of Felix Mendelssohn whose "Wedding March" has become legendary. If that doesn't earn any attention, then the list of players the studio had selected should. Of the performers credited on screen (by order of appearance), only Olivia De Havilland (billed DeHaviland), in her motion picture debut, gets a very impressive start to what's to become a long and successful career. For Warners, it's an achievement towards the Hall of Fame.PROCLAMATION: "From Theseus, our noble and valiant Duke, homeward bound from his defeat of the Amazonian Army, come greetings to his loyal subjects and the joyous news that before this moon is old, he will wed Hippolyta, Queen of the Amazons with pomp, with triumph, and with reveling. Let masques and plays be readied against the nuptial day to the actors chosen to play at the wedding of the Duke. A pension will be granted from the ducal treasury to the mount of sixpence for each actor every day of his life. Let every citizen of Athiens give fitting welcome to our noble lord." Set in Athens, the story begins at welcoming committee gathering of the royal court where several characters are introduced: Hermia (Olivia De Havilland) loves Lysander (Dick Powell) but by the choice of her father (Grant Mitchell), is to marry Demetrius (Ross Alexander), who's loved by Helena (Jean Muir). Theseus (Ian Hunter), the Duke of Athens, is set to marry Hippolyta, Queen of the Amazons (Verree Teasdale) with a celebration soon to be honored. Later, Hermia and Lysander elope, taking refuge in the forest. Demetrius follows the couple while Helena follows Demetrius. Also in the woods are tradesmen Bottom the Weaver (James Cagney), Flute (Joe E. Brown), Peter Quince (Frank McHugh), Snout (Hugh Herbert), Snug (Dewey Robinson), Robin (Otis Harlan) and Prologue (Arthur Treacher), rehearsing the play "Pyramus and Thisbe." Oberon, King of the Fairies (Victor Jory - in black body suit) and Titania, Queen of the Fairies (Anita Louise - all dressed in white), supernatural creatures of the night, make their arrival while Puck (Mickey Rooney - bear chested in ruffled loin cloth and Satan's horns on his forehead), the mischievous devilish boy of the woods, under instructions by Oberon, stirs up trouble by sprinkling passion flower juice on the loving couples to have them falling in love with the wrong partners. Before the night of fantasy is over, Puck uses the potion transforming Bottom's head into a donkey's, making certain that it's Bottom whom Titania, under the magic potion, first sees and falls in love. "What fools these mortals be."Along with opera, the works of Shakespeare can be a hard sell to the masses. How can Shakespeare be analyzed? Well, at first glance when I first watched MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM on broadcast television in 1972, I was more fascinated by the famous names associated with this production more than anything else. After getting into it, I found the plot hard to follow, spoken words in the Shakespearean tradition difficult to comprehend, resulting to very dull viewing. Still overlong and uneven, I've grown to comprehend as well as appreciate this Shakespearean fairy tale.For many years, all television and later home video prints were available from the edited 117 minute reissue. It wasn't until after 2000 when the initial theatrical 143 minute version become available to Turner Classic Movies followed by a 2007 DVD release with overture, "ten minute" intermission title and exit music (plus interesting commentary by Scott MacQueen). Had the movie been produced in Technicolor, it might have been outstanding. In "glorious black and white," the visuals are even more impressive, notably for the frequent use of dark photography for its imaginative ballet dance, presentation of hideous black elves and goblins, the spider web transformation to wedding veil and the return to Fairyland sequence adding much to its very haunting appeal.Of the many performers in stylish costumes, ranging from Cagney's donkey's head to the charm and beauty of DeHavilland, Louise and Muir, the one who stands apart from the others is young Mickey Rooney. Granted, his hideous laugh and hoarse voice can be as trite and annoying as Hugh Herbert's constant giggles, but by the time Roone's Puck recites his exit speech as he faces the camera, it's apparent that A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM is Rooney's show all the way. Joe E. Brown should not go unmentioned for some amusing bits of "unintentional comedy" as he muffles up a dramatic play. Others in the cast include Hobart Cavanaugh, Helen Westcott, Billy Barty and Nini Theilade as the Prima Ballerina. As much as Warners' A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM renewed the appeal of Shakespeare on film, earning an Academy Award nomination for Best Picture, the one most deserving was the win for best cinematography. There were other versions based on this tale, but in conclusion, they'll never be another one like this again. FINIS (***1/2)