Twelfth Night

This loose adaptation of Shakespeare's enduring but seldom-filmed comedy of merry and ribald romantic mix-ups comes from Trevor Nunn, distinguished director for the Royal Shakespearean Theatre, and features some of Great Britain's finest actors. Nunn has wrought a few major changes to the tale, updating it to the late 19th century and setting it during autumn. The language has also been somewhat simplified. Following a terrible shipwreck, bedraggled Viola washes up on the shores of Illyria, a country at war with her own. Believing that her twin brother Sebastian has drowned, and knowing that as a woman she would not survive on her own, she whacks off her hair, dons a moustache and masquerades as Cesario, a boy. She gets a job working for the dashing Duke Orsino and as his page begins pitching woo to the lovely and recently widowed Lady Olivia. The trouble brews when Olivia finds herself falling in love, not with Orsino, but with Cesario/Viola who herself has fallen in love with Orsino. More trouble follows when Sebastian arrives.