Review of The Crucible

Once you can get past the constant screeching, wailing and rediculous overacting in the utterly attrocious first act, there's probably a decent adaption of Arthur Miller's play in here somewhere - which there should be considering Milller wrote the screenplay. I won't get into the play's modern relevance (there isn't really any social commentary), post-McCarthyism, but Winona Ryder isn't very convincing as the manipulative Abigail and neither is the realtionship between her and an otherwise very good Daniel Day-Lewis as John Proctor. However, things really pick up by the time we get to act III and Paul Scofield is magnificent as Danforth. The final scene is immensley powerful but doesn't make up for the lacklustre first hour in which the fates of many of the characters, namely Tituba, are never seen. A score would probably have helped this film out.