After watching Shakespeare Behind Bars I looked into Shakespeare's literary work The Tempest because I thought it was ironic that the major themes of the play consisted of justice, forgiveness, and distinguishing "men" from "monsters." I enjoyed watching the film. Although I've been slammed with work and five exams this week, it was nice to take a break and get a chance to watch this. It is funny to watch how these men, who range from murders to thieves, transform into the roles they are playing.
The illusion of justice in evident in The Tempest. The idea represents the view of one character controls the fate of the others. This reminded me how our legal system works. The judge and the jurors control the fate of the people who stand before them in court. The prisoners from the correctional complex may be seeking their own justice. Not all prisoners are rightfully convicted, although majority of them are, and some may be trying to attain their freedom.
After researching The Tempest, although I did not thoroughly read it, I got the impression of distinguishing the good, honest men from the "monsters." The men portrayed in Shakespeare Behind Bars, in my opinion, can be classified as monsters. They don't seem to be monsters per say in the movie, but they had to of completed a terrible crime in order to end up in this correctional facility. The role of the acting and other programs is to get the men ready to re-entry into the world.
The play takes place on an island which is one last ironic detail I saw. The island has its own society and enclosure. A prison also is a place where individuals are confined, isolated, and separated from the rest of society. Overall, the comparisons between the prison and the play are pretty straight forward but the list could continue on. Are there any other comparisons that I missed?
I think the most interesting parallel that you alluded to was the idea of someone's fate being in the hands of someone else. The inmates reference that concept a few times in the movie: that because of their crimes they are now at the mercy of a system. Like the men of the island they are trapped and require the authority figure (Prospero/ Parole Board) to give them forgiveness. Of course, the movie also deals heavily with each man forgiving himself first and thus finding inspiration in Prospero's forgiving example.
ReplyDeleteWhat's tough, and what made the movie such challenging and interesting viewing for me, was that these people really WERE monsters, but because we never actually "saw" their crimes--only saw their teary confessions, followed by their even more teary (on the audience's part) redemptions--it was hard to actual think of them as the monsters they technically are. And I think that might have been the filmmakers' point.
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