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Poster for The Tempest

The Tempest

2010 · 1h 51m · PG-13 Comedy, Drama, Fantasy
Directed by Julie Taymor

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Overview

An adaptation of the play by William Shakespeare. Prospera (a female version of Shakespeare's Prospero) is the usurped ruler of Milan who has been banished to a mysterious island with her daughter. Using her magical powers, she draws her enemies to the island to exact her revenge.

Director and cast

Critics on Rotten Tomatoes

Top critics, in their words

All reviews
30%
Tomatometer
Fresh

You expect Nicolas Cage to pop up from behind a sand dune on a Harley brandishing a rocket launcher.

Cath Clarke, Time Out
Fresh

Taymor, by turning Prospero into a woman while retaining an "imperialist" view of Caliban, will no doubt simultaneously please and enrage left-wing critics. The rest of us can enjoy the movie's strengths...

David Denby, New Yorker
Rotten

Primarily an exercise in eccentric (and, I would argue, empty) spectacle.

J. R. Jones, Chicago Reader
Rotten

Normally I'd watch Helen Mirren in anything, even if she was just putting out the laundry or reading the phone book. But, given the roteness of her line readings here, it might have been better if the phone book rather than Shakespeare was her text.

Peter Rainer, Christian Science Monitor
Rotten

The costumes designed by Sandy Powell - leather gowns and military uniforms, Renaissance in silhouette and detailed with zippers - are the film's most arresting element.

Carrie Rickey, Philadelphia Inquirer

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