Julius Caesar (MGM) is the best Shakespeare that Hollywood has yet produced.* For one thing, Julius Caesar is a play that lends itself fairly easily to filming. Melodramatic rather than introspective, it is a sort of gangster picture with an ancient (44 B.C.) Roman setting. Its political-thriller plot—a bloody conspiracy, and the tyranny that is bred by lust for power—has obvious modern parallels.
This Julius Caesar falls considerably short of the grandeur of Sir Laurence Olivier's Henry V and the overpowering sense of tragedy of his Hamlet. Nor does it have the visual imagination of Orson Welles's Macbeth. But it is satisfying moviemaking, and, as an honest Hollywood try at Shakespeare, it deserves three rousing cheers.
Produced by John Houseman (who in 1937 put on a striking, modern-dress stage version of Julius Caesar with Orson Welles) and directed by Joseph (All About Eve) Mankiewicz, this is a polished and lavish production. But, dedicated to the theory that the play's the thing, it does not stress pageantry for its own sake. Faithful in letter and spirit to the play, the movie has no "additional dialogue," and the cuts are mainly in the last third of the play, traditionally considered expendable on the stage.
The star-spangled cast, recruited from both stage and screen, exhibits a wide variety of acting styles, but the individual performances are expert. Most unusual casting: Marlon Brando giving a flamboyant performance in the showy role of Mark Antony, Caesar's ruthless avenger. Cinemagoers who saw Brando in The Men and A Streetcar Named Desire may be surprised to hear him, minus his slurring Stanley Kowalski speech mannerisms, clearly enunciating the famous, rabble-rousing funeral oration. Less clear in his performance is that mercurial combination of demagogue and patriot, of force and "quick spirit" that is Antony's character. But Brando's characterization is more than competent, and his smouldering, sullen personality adds excitement to a crucial role.
The other performances, in a mixture of British and American accents, range most of the way from the formal to the folksy. In his Hollywood debut, veteran Shakespearean Actor John Gielgud gives the part of Cassius, leader of the conspirators, his meticulous diction, classic profile, and a lean and hungry look. Less traditional in their delivery are Louis Calhern, as a rather tired-looking Caesar, and Edmond O'Brien, in a departure from his usual cops & robbers roles, as Casca, the conspiracy's hatchet man. In the vital role of Brutus, James Mason gives an intense, brooding performance that effectively combines the poetic and the prosaic. Greer Garson and Deborah Kerr, as Caesar's wife Calpurnia and Brutus's wife Portia, are decoratively patrician, but have little to do in roles that are virtually bits.
To his friends—a good many of them bebop-talking actors, waitresses and artists—Marlon Brando, 29, is "the most," a "cool cat" off stage or on. If he has a reputation for being a "character," it is only because he dislikes conformity, either in his professional or private life.