As You Like It
HBO | Release Date: August 21, 2007
CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
75
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 15 Critic Reviews
Positive:
13
Mixed:
2
Negative:
0

Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
88
New York Daily NewsDavid Hinckley
Season 1 Review: As You Like It is effortlessly entertaining from start to finish. Read full review
88
USA TodayRobert Bianco
Season 1 Review: Happily, this is a carefully adapted, clearly enunciated As You Like It that retains the beauty of the dialogue while making the meanings clear. Read full review
80
San Jose Mercury News/Contra Costa TimesCharlie McCollum
Season 1 Review: Once you get used to the surroundings, it's still the same "As You Like It"--utterly charming and completely winning. Read full review
80
TimeStaff (Not Credited)
Season 1 Review: It's the strong cast, especially Bryce Dallas Howard as witty, strong-willed Rosalind, that gives this East-West fusion its flavor. Read full review
80
TV Guide MagazineMatt Roush
Season 1 Review: Director Kenneth Branagh's culture-clash gimmick doesn't get in the way of the play's many intoxicating pleasures. This isn't samurai Shakespeare. Read full review
80
The Hollywood ReporterBarry Garron
Season 1 Review: Unlike so many adaptations of Shakespeare's plays, this one not only pleases just as it stands but also could inspire a genuine curiosity in many viewers about seeing more of his work. Read full review
80
Pittsburgh Post-GazetteChristopher Rawson
Season 1 Review: There are several good "Twelfth Nights" on film and even more "Midsummer Night's Dreams," but we've never before had a good "As You Like It." This one is welcome. Read full review
80
Wall Street JournalNancy DeWolf Smith
Season 1 Review: The production is set among English traders in 19th-century Japan, the timeline of the action is altered, and some beloved examples of word play are no longer in the script. These are small matters, though, compared to the fresh gorgeousness on display and the elements of the story that come into focus here in new and moving ways. Read full review
80
VarietyBrian Lowry
Season 1 Review: It's a handsomely mounted production that will surely be welcomed by English majors the world over, especially those who would rather watch their homework than read it. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleDavid Wiegand
Season 1 Review: Most of the performances are very good and some are thrilling, particularly Kline's Jacques, whom he imbues with great world-weary nobility. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesRobert Lloyd
Season 1 Review: Branagh plays up the dark side of this town-in-the-country pastoral--partly by turning exposition into sometimes violent action, partly by trimming the banter--to deepen the romance. (He likes a pratfall, though.) Mostly it works. Read full review
70
Boston GlobeMatthew Gilbert
Season 1 Review: It's a likable one, marred only by some awkward abridgement. Read full review
70
Chicago TribuneMaureen Ryan
Season 1 Review: Branagh directs his actors through the intricacies of Shakespeare’s language with a sure hand, though I sometimes wished during the forest scenes the camera didn’t swoop and swivel quite so much. Read full review
60
PopMattersJesse Hicks
Season 1 Review: The writer-director makes some inspired, insightful cinematic choices. However, the play’s untidiness--it’s one of Shakespeare’s most mischievous--virtually guarantees a final product distinguished by individual performances rather than dramatic consistency. Read full review
50
The New York TimesVirgina Heffernan
Season 1 Review: Mr. Branagh has teased out every manly rivalry and preserved every hey-nonny-nonny of the kooks in the Forest of Arden, but slashed passages of the repartee that defines Rosalind. Read full review
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