It seems as though there have been more famous deaths than usual this year, but what few would deny is that the death of Sir Tom Stoppard in November, one of the undeniably brilliant playwrights of his or any generation, is indeed a great loss to the world of theatre. And a loss to film, where Stoppard had a long career as a screenwriter that saw him win an Oscar in 1999, shared with Marc Norman for Shakespeare in Love. In tribute to the Czech-born British playwright, here are three films that Stoppard penned the adapted screenplays for, including one of his own seminal plays, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, and films directed by Steven Spielberg and the erratic Golden Hollywood era émigré master Otto Preminger.
THE ARTHOUSE ESSENTIAL
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead – YouTube
The only film that Stoppard directed himself is aptly this 1990 adaptation of his most famous work — the 1966 breakthrough play that focuses on the supporting characters from Hamlet and reimagines their final moments through a distinctively dark and absurdist lens.
Starring Gary Oldman and Tim Roth as Hamlet’s bumbling, out-of-their-depth friends, the film is predominantly a two-hander, set in the wings of Elsinore and featuring cameos from some of the bard’s more famous characters.
Though it was icily received by many critics at the time as a flat and listless onscreen treatment of a play noted for its quirkiness and dynamism, it’s developed something of a cult reputation over the last three decades and remains a brave attempt by its creators and stars to do justice to the intentions and spirit of the stage version, with performances from its leads that were unfairly dismissed at the time.
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THE STONE-COLD CLASSIC
Empire of the Sun – Rent or buy from Apple TV+
Steven Spielberg’s 1987 adaptation of the 1984 semi-autobiographical novel by JG Ballard stars a very young Christian Bale as Jamie “Jim” Graham, whose life with his wealthy parents in World War 2 Shanghai is upended when he becomes a prisoner of war in a Japanese internment camp.
In the decade when Spielberg made his name for big-budget action and sci-fi adventures like E.T. and Indiana Jones, the film reminds us of his abilities as a director of smaller, engaging and emotionally moving drama.
Perhaps somewhat underrated at the time, it’s since earned a deserved reputation as one of cinema’s most heartfelt depictions of the overwhelming chaotic events of the adult world as seen through the eyes of a child losing innocence too quickly.
That’s thanks in no small part to Stoppard’s considered adaptation of the material. His original draft was written in brief collaboration with Ballard, and originally the film was to be directed by legendary British director David Lean, whose films like Lawrence of Arabia and The Bridge over the River Kwai Spielberg had lifelong admiration for.
Lean eventually passed on the film and handed it over to Spielberg, who, when reading the book, had secretly dreamed of directing an adaptation. Though he handed over Stoppard’s original script to another writer for an uncredited rewrite, it was eventually crafted into its final form by Stoppard, who earned a Bafta nomination for his work.
The combination of Stoppard’s faithful adaptation and Spielberg’s preternatural talent for conveying its young hero’s childhood wonder and perplexity at the tumultuous events enveloping him have served to see its reputation shift over the decades from underappreciated gem to stone-cold classic.
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THE DIAMOND IN THE ROUGH
The Human Factor – YouTube
More interesting as the final film of the notoriously difficult but undeniably singular Austro-Hungarian-born director Otto Preminger than a satisfyingly realised work on its own merits, there’s still plenty of fascination to be found in this 1979 adaptation of the 1978 noirish espionage novel by Graham Greene, inspired by the real-life shocks of the betrayal of notorious double agent Kim Philby.
Adapted by Stoppard and starring Nicol Williamson, Robert Morley and Richard Attenborough, the story focuses on an upper-class, mid-level bureaucrat with an unremarkable life who is faced with difficult and life-changing decisions when “the Circus” initiates a hunt for a mole in its ranks.
Representing the end of Preminger’s career and the final point in a line of radicalised, stylised filmmaking that he’d been pursuing in most of his work since the mid-1960s, it’s an uneven spy thriller whose first part is stronger than the second half that quite badly lets it down.
There is, for Preminger fans and Stoppard admirers, still enough to be enticed by, and there’s also the fascinating trivia fact of Preminger’s original choice for the lead role — the novelist and still not yet convicted, fallen-from-grace former Conservative MP Jeffrey Archer, whose lack of height in relation to supermodel Iman — cast as Williamson’s African wife — ultimately dashed his possible third career as a matinee idol. Preminger’s woes were further compounded when, in the middle of production, he ran out of money and was forced to sell artworks and other possessions to finish it.
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