Midsummer Night's Dream, A MPAA Rating: PG-13 Entertainment: +2 1/2 Content: -1

In A MIDSUMMER NIGHTS DREAM a mischievous fairy named Puck (Stanley Tucci) uses magic potions to confuse the relationships between four young people, Helena (Calista Flockhart), Hermia (Anna Friel), Demetrius (Christian Bale) and Lysander (Dominic West). Hermia has been promised by her father to Demetrius, but she loves Lysander. She is offered three choices by the duke, Theseus (David Strathairn): marry Demetrius, become a nun, or die. When Hermia flees to the wood with Lysander, Helena tips off Demetrius to follow them. Maybe if he sees his promised with another man, he will return to Helena. Demetrius was Helena's lover, but now loves Hermia. Also in the woods that night are Bottom (Kevin Kline) and his friends, rehearsing a play to be performed at the wedding of Theseus and Queen Hippolyta (Sophie Marceau). And the Fairy Queen Titania (Michelle Pfeiffer), her husband Oberon (Rupert Everett), Puck and other fairies are fluttering about the forest. Especially memorable is the clumsy play performed at the wedding by Bottom and his friends, a truly humorous scene of just good clean fun. A MIDSUMMER NIGHT promises to bring laughter and a little dose of culture to movie audiences everywhere.

Set in 19th century Italy, but faithful to Shakespeare's original verse in his play A MIDSUMMER NIGHTS DREAM, this screenplay interjects only two mild crude words. The magic and fairy activity are portrayed in a purely fun and fanciful manner, providing a lighthearted fantasy tale. Disappointing, however, is the inclusion of frontal breast nudity of fairies swimming in a pond. The four lovers are also seen sleeping together naked in the forest, but breasts, genitals, and buttocks are obscured. Sexual intercourse is implied three times, in the forest scene, at the end of the movie when the couples are seen in their wedding beds, and, in a slightly more telling scene, Queen Titania is shown on top of Bottom in bed but no nudity is shown. Scantily clad fairies and ladies with low cut Elizabethan dresses are also shown throughout. The young lovers passionately kiss several times, and once Lysander fondles Hermias breast through her nightgown. Because of the nudity and sexual elements, this whimsical MIDSUMMER NIGHTS DREAM earns a slightly objectionable rating from Preview.

Preview Reviewer: Cliff McNeely
Distributor: Distributor: 20th Century Fox, 10201 W. Pico Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90035