In the buzzed-about comedy Hamlet 2, out in limited release this week, a frustrated drama teacher (played by Steve Coogan) motivates his students and shocks the censors by producing a politically incorrect musical “sequel” to Shakespeare’s Hamlet in which Hillary Clinton and Jesus Christ are both supporting characters.
Of course, Shakespeare having lived and died long before copyright law was established, his works certainly can be freely adapted by anybody willing to take a crack at them – and while some folks, like Orson Welles and Kenneth Branagh, have taken pride in staying true to the Bard’s vision in their adaptations, plenty of others have dared to take some gutsy and occasionally dazzling liberties with the plays everybody knows and loves. In honor of Hamlet 2’s not-quite-reverent approach to the greatest tragedy of all time, here are a few films that really pushed the envelope in bringing Shakespeare to the screen – being something of a nonconformist himself, I think he would have enjoyed them a lot.

O (2001)

Shakespeare’s Othello revolves around jealousy, prejudice and back-stabbing, and where can one possibly find more of that stuff than in high school? Still, while transferring the story to a modern teenage setting might have been a no-brainer, Tim Blake Nelson’s O goes the extra step to be a compelling drama rather than just another gimmicky modernization.
Mekhi Phifer – in one of his best performances to date – stars as basketball phenom Odin James, the only black student at a prestigious private school who’s driven by duplicitous teammate Hugo (Josh Hartnett) into suspecting his girlfriend Desi (Julia Stiles) is cheating on him. Things, of course, get tragic and violent from there.
A powerful and surprisingly unsparing adaptation – it was shelved for several years after the Columbine tragedy – O is a terrific reminder of how relevant many of Shakespeare’s themes still are, and of how effectively they can be spun into contemporary narratives in the right hands.

Tromeo & Juliet (1996)
Leave it to the lovable sleazeballs at Troma Studios to turn the most famous romantic tragedy ever written into an orgy of blood, boobs, and body piercing that makes the Leo DiCaprio version look as tame as children’s theater.
That’s not to say that Tromeo & Juliet, one of Troma’s most ambitious and well-received low-budget productions, completely throws the text out the window – characters actually speak in verse, though it’s liberally sprinkled with cuss words – but somehow I doubt that the Globe Theatre ever featured mutated cow creatures or softcore lesbian action on its stage. Narrated by Motorhead frontman Lemmy Kilmeister (an awesome touch), Tromeo and Juliet finds its lovestruck title characters (played by Will Keenan and Jane Jensen) caught in the midst of a war between rival porn-producing families in an urban crap-hole setting, soundtracked by the likes of Wesley Willis and the Ass Ponys.
The film launched the career of its writer, James Gunn, who’d go on to script the surprisingly decent Dawn of the Dead remake and his later directorial debut, the underappreciated horror/comedy masterpiece Slither.

Macbeth (1971)

Unlike the 2001 Sundance favorite Scotland, Pa., which stages Macbeth in a 1970s-era fast-food restaurant, or the John Turturro cult item Men of Respect, which translates it into a mafia movie, Roman Polanski’s take on one of the Bard’s best-known tragedies is actually pretty faithful to the source material. It nevertheless makes this list by being so bloody, gritty and atmospheric that it plays more like an artsy, big-budget grindhouse flick than a stately Shakespearian drama.
Wild-eyed British actor Jon Finch plays the title role in this U.S./U.K. coproduction, which contains a memorably sympathetic portrayal of Lady Macbeth (Francesca Annis) and an exceedingly bleak tone that many critics saw as Polanski’s reaction to the murder of his wife Sharon Tate by the Manson family. As dark and cold as its rocky Welsh settings, the film is one of the most “realistic” screen versions of the story I’ve ever seen, though it also contains some decidedly trippy sequences – particularly those involving the story’s infamous coven of witches. The sound effect that accompanies Macbeth’s hallucinations in the famous “is this a dagger I see before me” scene is worth the price of admission alone.

Titus (1999)

Broadway director Julie Taymor made her feature film debut with this visually stunning adaptation of Titus Andronicus, Shakespeare’s first and most notorious play – a charming tale of rape, murder, and torture that seems more like the work of the Hills Have Eyes folks than it does the guy who penned A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
Rather than going for a straight-up retelling or modernization of the sensationalistic story, however, Taymor opts for a wildly stylistic, almost avant-garde approach to the material, creating a jaw-dropping hybrid of past and present, fantasy and reality in which motorcycles coexist with chariots, flashbacks are presented in music video-like style, and toy soldiers transform into actual Roman warriors. Anthony Hopkins, playing the title role, heads a terrific cast that also includes Jessica Lange, Alan Cumming, and Jonathan Rhys-Meyers; the ace production design, inspired by everything from ancient Rome to WWII Italy to Rat Pack-era Las Vegas, is handled by Fellini’s go-to guy Dante Ferretti.
This is a nearly three-hour movie, based on one of the most unpleasant stories ever written, but trust me – you won’t be able to take your eyes off of it for the duration.