Movies Like Macbeth, Shakespeare’s Sublime Tragedy

Infatuation

1925

Infatuation is based on Caesar's Wife, a story by Somerset Maugham. Dazzlingly British socialite Viola Morgan falls madly in love with professional soldier Sir Arthur Little at a dinner party. The two marry, and before long Viola has relocated to Egypt with her husband. Soon bored by her hothouse existence, Viola succumbs to the attentions of young British attache Ronald Perry.

Penny of Top Hill Trail

1921

Penny arrives in the West by aeroplane. She is considered a suspicious character and thrown into jail. Kurt Walters, a ranch foreman and deputy sheriff, discovers that she is the same girl that his friend, Jo Gary, met in Chicago. Gary fell in love with her, but she confessed she was a thief. Since Penny claims she wants to reform, Walters releases her and sends her to live with Mrs. Kingdon. In spite of her teasing and taunts (or perhaps because of them), Walters finds himself falling in love with Penny.

The Devil's Scherzo

1918

The Reckless Lady

1926

Set amidst French resorts and featuring gambling casinos and an automobile race, a mother and wife develops a mania for gambling, much to the dismay of her husband and daughter. A lost film.

Sin

1916

The Dancer of Paris

1926

National Theatre Live: Hamlet

2015

As a country arms itself for war, a family tears itself apart. Forced to avenge his father's death but paralyzed by the task ahead, Hamlet rages against the impossibility of his predicament, threatening both his sanity and the security of the state.

Hamlet

1948

Winner of four Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Actor, Sir Laurence Olivier’s Hamlet continues to be the most compelling version of Shakespeare’s beloved tragedy. Olivier is at his most inspired—both as director and as the melancholy Dane himself—as he breathes new life into the words of one of the world’s greatest dramatists.

The Unforgivable

2021

A woman is released from prison after serving a sentence for a violent crime and re-enters a society that refuses to forgive her past.

Little Lord Fauntleroy

1980

Young Cedric Errol and his widowed mother live in genteel poverty in 1880s Brooklyn after the death of his father. Cedric's grandfather, the Earl of Dorincourt, has long ago disowned his son for marrying an American. But after the death of the Earl's remaining son, he decides to accept Cedric as his heir.

The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds

1972

Middle-aged widow Beatrice Hunsdorfer and her daughters Ruth and Matilda are struggling to survive in a society they barely understand. Beatrice dreams of opening an elegant tea room but does not have the wherewithal to achieve her lofty goal. Epileptic Ruth is a rebellious adolescent, while shy but highly intelligent and idealistic Matilda seeks solace in her pets and school projects, including one designed to show how small amounts of radium affect marigolds.

Macbeth

1948

Macbeth, the Thane of Glamis, receives a prophecy from a trio of witches that one day he will become King of Scotland. Consumed by ambition and spurred to action by his wife, Macbeth commits a treasonous act and takes the throne for himself.

Macbeth

1971

Scotland, 11th century. Driven by the twisted prophecy of three witches and the ruthless ambition of his wife, warlord Macbeth, bold and brave, but also weak and hesitant, betrays his good king and his brothers in arms and sinks into the bloody mud of a path with no return, sown with crime and suspicion.

Wolves of the Night

1919

Mining engineer and rancher Bruce Andrews marries Eastern visitor Isabel Hollins, stirring jealousy in rival mine owner Edmund Rawn and his partner Burton Mortimer, who both desire Isabel, leading to clashes over land, romance, and unscrupulous business practices.

Babylon

1980

Drama telling the story of Blue, a young man of Jamaican descent living in Brixton in 1980, as he hangs out with his friends, fronts a dub sound system, loses his job, struggles with family problems and has his friendships tested by racism.

The Young One

1960

A jazz musician seeks refuge from a lynch mob on a remote island, where he meets a hostile game warden and the young object of his attentions.

Tigertail

2020

A man reflects on the lost love of his youth and his long-ago journey from Taiwan to America as he begins to reconnect with his estranged daughter.

Hands of Stone

2016

The legendary Roberto Duran and his equally legendary trainer Ray Arcel change each other's lives.