Historians beware. Roland Emmerich’s Anonymous is an intricately imaginative film inspired by the long-lived conspiracy theory that William Shakespeare did not write a single word of meaningful literature.
Giving this movie a succinct synopsis is a difficult task, seeing as Emmerich makes his storyline(s) as complicated as possible. The film (briefly) starts at a present day theater production to set the stage (so to speak) for these conspiracies. Then it’s off to the Elizabethan Era, where playwright Ben Johnson (Sebastian Armesto), in possession of “Shakespeare’s” works, is attempting to elude capture and imprisonment. Another venture back through time and the Earl of Oxford Edward de Vere (Rhys Ifans) is approaching Johnson with a proposition. De Vere is wealthy and powerful, but the art of writing is considered idol worship for someone in his social class. As such, he is to give Johnson all of his works (Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, etc.) so that they can still be performed for the public, though with Johnson putting his name on the plays and poems, leaving de Vere as the anonymous true author.
Johnson is a prideful writer, however, and getting paid to take credit for someone else’s work doesn’t sit well with him. But the duplicity is no problem at all for illiterate actor William Shakespeare (Rafe Spall), and he assumes ownership of these wildly successful plays and ascends to glorious fame, which leads to the building of The Globe theatre.
But everything is a whole lot more complicated than that. Most everyone has various political motivations, so we get yet another time warp some 30-40 years in the past to see how political players like de Vere and his archenemy Robert Cecil (Edward Hogg) came to be. And we find that the young “Virgin Queen” Elizabeth actually has a family tree with numerous branches. This unpacking of Elizabeth’s familial line coupled with a struggle for the throne ends up a dominant storyline in Anonymous, at least as important as the search for the true author of Richard III.
Meanwhile, I’m already annoyed 15 minutes into Anonymous, trying to decide if it’s an Elizabethan era Inception and struggling to sort out how many time-travels-within-a-time-travel is too many. It doesn’t help that several characters look similar — young Edward de Vere and the Earl of Southampton, Shakespeare and Robert Cecil, young Queen Elizabeth and one of de Vere’s mistresses — and that everyone’s name is a mouthful except for Ben Johnson.
Though far from a masterpiece, Anonymous isn’t a train wreck either. To its credit, the acting is foolproof. It doesn’t necessarily matter if this is fiction or non-fiction, and it doesn’t matter how great of a script John Orloff whipped up. What’s ultimately important is that these people believe what they are saying, and that the fictitious history they are living is real.
While Ifans does a tremendous job with de Vere, making all the little things count (constantly rubbing his ink-stained fingers together like an oracle or something), his character cannot stand alone as this movie’s protagonist. He’s our William Shakespeare, our true playwright, but his faults and shortcomings while human, are too numerous for the audience to rally behind the character. The same goes for Queen Elizabeth, whose portrayal I assume will only make bitter the admirers of the royal family. And Shakespeare is nothing more than a lowlife here, a man of such little integrity that he inevitably blackmails de Vere for more money.
Johnson ends up being the one to relate to. He turns down an opportunity to become the world’s most brilliant playwright, then beats himself up for it. Being the bigger man hurts like hell a lot of the time. That’s an idea I can sympathize with. The only problem is that Johnson’s role is overshadowed by the politics and the incestual romances.
Well-written and well-acted, Emmerich’s Anonymous is constantly being bogged down with plot point after plot point. It’s far too involved for us to care about or focus on any one character. And while it’s an intriguing take on history, I’ll never be comfortable seeing the author of Macbeth reduced to an asinine supporting role in a movie apparently about him.
This article appears in Oct 27 – Nov 2, 2011.