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SPOILERS must be tagged with the "SPOILER" tag!

I vehemently disagree with this. Is there a statute of limitations placed on acknowledgement of authorship? Just because Newton and Leibniz are dead doesn't mean the issue of according authorship to the discovery of Calculus is moot---one can make the point that Calculus is a beautiful theory in itself, but understanding the history and origins of a theory is an important and separate issue.

Similarly, Francis Crick died in 2004. It's been a good 7 years since his death. So I guess it's fine if we just forget that he discovered the structure of DNA because hey, he's not going to care, right?

The best quote from Wikipedia is


I have no problems with enjoying the movie (which I've not watched) as a creative 'what-if'. But reviewers (especially reviewers with a background in science as James!) should not be saying that "it doesn't matter"! Intellectual property is important in the sciences and arts...even so after the passing of the authors.

I saw this at TIFF and while pretty to look at, I felt like this was a film filled with great actors and a poor script. Even if viewed as complete fiction, which it must be toward the end, it just gets ridiculous with all the twists. Having some knowledge of Shakespeare's plays and life from my English BA actually proves to be a hindrance in watching this because they mess around with the order the plays are written, especially Macbeth, which makes references to James I 's descendants, but you wouldn't know that according to the movie. I won't pretend to an expert, but if they are going to go with an alternative theory then they should have gone with Francis Bacon who is at least alive for the later plays and would have had the same education as Oxford. I also don't believe that Shakespeare would have been as moronic as Rafe Spall makes him out to be, just because he is not an aristocrat, because there would have been far more evidence of this "conspiracy" being leaked if Shakespeare was actually that dumb.

I think if you know nothing about Shakespeare and the details surrounding the plays, and Tudor history, or anything about English or Scottish history, then you can enjoy this. Otherwise you will have to overlook at lot of ridiculousness. Shakespeare in Love felt more historically accurate than this movie.

On the issue of climate change, it's no longer denial. People are no longer swallowing the bullshit that has been fed to them, however much it is based in fact. Thanks to the media, people no longer take it seriously. In addition, governments have done nothign but cash in on people's fears, leading many to the obvious conclusion that real danger is non existent.

To quote Bertrand Russell "The fact that an opinion has been widely held is no evidence whatsoever that it is not utterly absurd: indeed in view of the silliness of the majority of mankind, a widespread belief is more likely to be foolish than sensible".

I do agree with the idea that having knowledge of British history will possibly spoil the movie a little however my enjoyment will be the movie itself, not the accuracies in the screenplay.

I too had problems with this statement. Climate Change deniers are not really a minority. I think most people, myself, included fall somewhere in the middle regarding that topic (sorry, but liberals haven't taken over completely yet). Shakespeare deniers are more akin to big foot believers, and associating that mentality with a political stance is a bit shaky.

This was a very entertaining movie despite it being the filled with bad history.Also enjoyed the class conscious idea that a glover's son could not write a play as it would take an aristocrat for that.Also some of the plays are produced far too as Macbeth was done during James reign not Elizabeth.Nothing like sucking up to the boss.You have to love a conspiracy theory where there is absolutely no evidence for anything that is alleged by the Oxfordians other than the idea the lack of evidence is evidence.Going through the book "Contested Will" you see the history of how each group of proponents built cases for candidates like Bacon and Oxford.The one thing that stands out for Oxford is a complete lack of any kind of evidence linking him to playwrighting and not even a mention of a rumour that he may have had a hand in something.Shakespeare did not own any of his plays as they were owned by the theater group and when sold to a publisher they were owned by the publisher from then on.So while it may profit you a bit it also could get you put in the Tower of London.Some playwrights were tortured/killed for information when something they wrote was considered treasonous.

Having said that is does not really matter who wrote the plays is an okay device for historical fiction but not okay in historical research.Many historians do hard work to uncover documents and build a case for how things happened and to set the historical record right.The problem with Shakepeare there is not much material to work with and this allows people create the thin edge of the wedge and insert theories that are implausible but creative and persuasive.With Shakespeare the effect is only academic but historical lies and mistruths can be manipulated some people to deny the Holocaust or Armenian massacres(which a proTurkish American professor I had did in one lecture during a history class in college)

Bigfoot is more likely than the absence of human-caused climate change. No, the liberals haven't taken over yet, but big business has, at least in the US. A recent survey found (this is not a joke) that those who watch Fox News are less informed than those who watch no news at all.