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Joseph Fiennes plays the role of Bassanio

Joseph Fiennes creates an exceptional Bassanio, a lover both forceful and flawed, heroic but human. Lynn Collins' Portia is stunning, not only gloriously beautiful but brilliant and self-possessed—ultimately, the play's driving force. How else is our interest kept once the dueling merchants leave the stage? She has all the appeal of Shrew's Kate, without the hard-to-swallow capitulation at the end. The agonizingly protracted trial is as taut, tense and dangerous as any courtroom scene anywhere, and Portia's centerpiece appeal for mercy stopped me from breathing. As conflicted as we may be about the play's unnerving—and perhaps unknowing—anti-Semitism, as galled as we may be by its questionable conversions, the core of it all is the core of the gospel, untainted: the exaltation of mercy over justice. This film flinches from neither the shameful nor the transcendent. They coexist in dazzling, confusing juxtaposition, the confounding tensions and contradictions lending the story both its controversy and its artistry.

This Merchant's Venice is exotic but real, mired in dirty, bloody specifics that contrast wondrously with its fairy-tale vision of Belmont. There's dreadful power in setting the "pound of flesh" negotiations at a Jewish meat market: a goat is bled into the canal presaging the bargain's ultimate resolution, bringing the deeper realization that bloody meat just isn't kosher. Red wax drains onto the contract like blood to seal the deal.

The film is rich with interconnections and juxtapositions. Jessica's father gives her keys to lock herself away from her suitors: we cut directly to the keys Portia's father decreed should divine her true husband. And how about the beautifully foregrounded detail about Jessica's ring—on whose evidence do we believe that monkey story, after all? I marveled at the way it humanized Shylock all the more, connecting his history with the young lovers' courtship, finally resonating in those haunting and cryptic closing images.

Jeremy Irons in the role of Antonio

Critics and audiences will agonize and argue over this potent rendering of a play so problematic to 21st century eyes. Some will question whether the film should have been made. Perhaps the anti-Semitism isn't simply a character flaw, but a failure of both play and playwright. And it's not just Jews who will feel shamed, threatened and misunderstood by this story: Christians too may feel like targets, wondering if we really need another movieful of bigoted, self-righteous "true believer" caricatures. The fact is, nobody comes off looking good here: all fall short of the glory of God. Maybe even the Bard himself.

I'm glad to see these battles rejoined, glad these questions will again be talked about, felt about, fought about. The long and terrible history of enmity between Christians and Jews leaves a legacy of guilt and unforgiveness and judgment. Perhaps this time, in at least a few of those arguments, Portia's plea will win out: our insistence on law and just recompense will give way, and Jesus' great prayer will at last teach us to render the deeds of mercy.

Talk About It

1. Is Shylock, as "a money-loving Jew," an unacceptable racial stereotype? Or does Shakespeare succeed in subverting the prejudicial view of his day by humanizing the character? "I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions, fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer, as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die?"
   
   
2. It is said that an unforgiving person damages himself more than the one he will not forgive, and here it seems that Shylock's bitterness consumes him. Have you ever carried a grudge that ultimately damaged you? How can we get beyond our unforgiveness?
   
   

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