At lunch today we were discussing movies. Which led to Star Trek. Which led to a discussion of Star Trek VI, which led to a discussion of Shakespeare movie references. Ok, I may have been driving the discussion in that direction. 🙂
Here’s the question I was asked: What movie, that is not fundamentally a movie about Shakespeare, contains the highest amount of Shakespeare references?
Star Trek VI, of course, would be a good example. Shakespeare in Love would not.
What do we think?
EDIT : I wasn’t very clear by “references,” I meant “actual quotes.” Not just plot lines or character names.
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Lion King seems like an obvious choice.
Quiz Show has a few.
Good point — though in this case (and I'll fix the question) we were thinking more about specific Shakespeare quotes. I'm not sure Lion King doesn't have many of those.
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Ahhh.
Not sure whether it counts as a Shakespeare Movie or not, but Vincent Price's 1973 'Theatre of Blood' (Overlooked actor kills theatre critics in manner of deaths from Shakespeare plays) has a loads of the Bard (with quotes) in it!
I've been thinking about this on and off all weekend. It's not a category I immediately have in my brain.
Free Enterprise has a few—but they're mainly related to a production of Julius Caesar that William Shatner is producing.
I think Bollywood / Hollywood would be my best selection for a film that doesn't obviously have something to do with Shakespeare (no one in it is putting on a play; it's not a retelling of a Shakespeare plot) yet that has a number of Shakespeare quotes / allusions in it—except all the quotes are slightly wrong:
http://bardfilm.blogspot.com/2010/09/bollywood-hollywood.html
How about TV shows that use Shakespeare? You'll find quite a number of times in M*A*S*H where Shakespeare is quoted or alluded to . . . and not always in conjunction with a play or a discussion of a Shakespeare character.
kj