A Midsummer Night's Dream

           A Midsummer Night's Dream is truly one of Shakespeare's most amazing plays. Even though I did not really understand some parts of it, I am convinced that this story is very significant. Shakespeare is difficult to understand but also unique because of the vocabulary, the accent in the movie, and the time it takes place in.
           From the instant I looked at the first page of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, I knew that reading it would be a challenge. One of the things that makes Shakespeare one of the most amazing playwrights, also makes hime one of the most difficult writers to understand. His writitings are so difficult, many of them have to be translated into versions that are much easier. The vocabulary in A Midsummer Night's Dream was very hard for me but reading the footnotes and watching the movie made it much easier for me.
          The movie of this play was very helpful for me except for the accent. I sometimes have trouble understanding regular movies but shakespeare's movies are like a foreign language I had never heard of before. For me, it was as though they were not speaking English at all. Maybe it is just me, because I am bilingual and I can not understand some things very well. This play was very good though and I enjoyed it, but maybe I would have enjoyed it more if I did not have trouble understanding the accent in the movie.
           The time the movie takes place is confusing to me. I did not understand why Helena was riding a bicycle. Shakespeare was born in the 1500's and the bicycle was invented in the 1800's. This made the play seem more realistic in the actual movie but it made it seem unrealistic in real life because it did not go with the way Shakespeare meant the play to be.
           In conclusion. Shakespeare has been and will always be one of the greatest playwrights to have ever existed. Even before I knew who he was, I would always hear about his plays. I had heard of A Midsummer Night's Dream even before I knew Shakespeare had written it. This shows how truly great his plays were and how famous they have come to be. Even though Shakespeare's play was difficult for me to understand because of the vocabulary, accent in the actual movie, and because of the time it was written, I still enjoyed it because of its uniqueness.

                                                              Works Cited
Shakespeare, William. No Fear Shakespear: A Midsummer Night's Dream.
                  1595. New York: Sparknotes, 2003. Sparknotes. Web. February,
                  21, 2011.

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street

           Sweeney Todd is the scariest movie I have seen in my life. It is not scary in a spooky way but in a gruesome way. I had never watched a movie like that mostly because I am not allowed to. I tried not to look at the parts where Sweeny Todd is doing all the killing but I could still hear the sounds and some parts came up so quick that I did not have time to turn away. One of those parts was when Sweeney Todd killed Lucy. I saw right when he cut her neck. Even though the movie was filled with horror, I still enjoyed watching it for the most part. I liked it mostly because of all the singing and also because of Johnny Depp. He is such a good actor and singer. All of the songs in the movie were very interesting and different. A song that was very unique was the one that Sweeney Todd sung about his razors being his friends. This song was very different from any song I have ever heard but it only added up to the meaning of the story. The song that I enjoyed the most is the one little Toby sung to Mrs. Lovett where he tells her nothing will hurt her as long as he's around. Overall the movie was very good except for the parts where Sweeney Todd kills people. I really enjoyed watching this movie because of all the singing.

Arsenic and Old Lace

           Arsenic and Old Lace is a great movie. I really enjoyed watching it during class. Usually black and white movies do not entertain me very much but when they do I really like them. At home sometimes my mom and dad watch black and white movies and I get so bored that I can not finish watching the whole movie. The way they dressed and even talked back then is very different than now. Even though I do not regularly watch black and white movies, I do think that they have much more meaning than the ones from now. Most of the movies from now are filled with cursing and even drugs. I liked Arsenic and Old Lace mostly because it was funny. It is funny how Teddy "Roosevelt" thinks that he is the president of the United States and screams "Chaaaarge" everytime he gets chance. I also find all of the facial expressions Mortimer Brewster does all throughout the movie hilarious. Not only was this movie funny but it was also ironic. That is another reason why I enjoyed it so much. It was filled with irony which made the movie even more suspensfull. I never knew what else to expect. It is so ironic that the two "innocent" aunts were the ones doing all the killing.  Martha and Abby Brewster were the ones that were insane all along and not Teddy like everyone thought. Teddy was crazy but not as crazy as the two aunts. I really enjoyed watching this movie and it only adds to my perception about black and white movies. I think that most black and white movies are not very interesting but the ones that are interesting are even better than the ones in color.