A few years ago, I was given a copy of Ian McKellen�s Richard III, which I reluctantly took. Usually, whenever I try to watch Shakespeare it takes me fifteen minutes into the movie before I can begin to grasp what the actors are saying.



The exception was Romeo and Juliet, with age-appropriate actors. Both Leonard Whiting and Olivia Hussey were in their teens�not like Norma Shearer and Leslie Howard, in their thirties, with Howard wearing a hairpiece, although a very good hairpiece (I never knew he wore one until I read a Selznick biography).



This film grasped my attention from the very beginning. McKellen must have been inspired to set it in an alternate-reality 1930s Britain. I watched the film several times and gave it as a �loaner� to someone, who never watched it, and worse, never returned it. Now, I want another copy for my collection.



Gary Judkins