I agree with most of the prior reviewers (save the one who doesn't seem to understand cinema), and was especially struck by the art direction and cinematography. The B/W palette fit perfectly in both the castle and in the desolate moors, as Lear wandered mad with his fool. The acting was superb. However, I was completely flummoxed listening to it. I studied Russian for 3.5 years in school and on a high school summer trip to the USSR. Sadly I have forgotten most of it. However, the viewing I saw in 2009 certainly brought a lot of back in a strange way. I had read parts of Pasternak's Russian translation, and he did a wonderful job capturing the iambic pentameter, puns, and subtleties of Elizabethan English. However, the film, as others pointed out, used Estonian or Latvian actors whose Russian was so bad that much had to be looped after the filming by Russian speakers. Consequently, a long and flowery phrase in the Pasternak translation-- dutifully subtitled back into English-- is truncated. E.g., "Mend your speech a little, Lest it may mar your fortunes" is translated well in subtitles, but what is spoken is "govoreet prosto" ("speak simply"). I tried to read the subtitles instead of listen to the Russian, but came out of the theater pretty confused!
King Lear
(1970)
English to written Russian to spoken EstoRussian to English subtitles
31 March 2012