The Merchant of Venice (2004)

One of the reasons I waivered for so long about writing a post about The Merchant of Venice (2004) is because the subject matter seems more than a little tricky to navigate in today’s climate of antisemitism, combined with a more critical modern eye cast on Elizabethan moralizing. Having read the play in high school, these feelings of conflict about the densely layered subtext within subtext within subtext were probably one of my earliest introductions to sympathizing with the supposed bad guy and picking right up on the hypocrisy of so-called Christian values. That said, I’m no Shakespearean scholar, and tying myself up in logical knots trying to figure out what Shakespeare’s actual motives were with Shylock is really not what this blog is about. I wouldn’t have even brought it up were not for the fact that if I didn’t say something about all of the myriad of ways Shylock is stripped of his humanity by the end of this so-called comedy, I’m sure one of you would have slid into the comments with a snarky comment about how we are failing to point out how problematic the subject matter is. I love you guys, but seriously. You tend to do that.

So, with all that out in the open, let’s talk about what we are actually here to talk about, THE COSTUMES. I will admit, I had some preconceived notions going into the film that I was going to hate the costumes, or at the very least, mutter some disapproving comments under my breath, because there area quite a bit of the rampant frock flick cliches in The Merchant of Venice that we routinely poke holes in. That said, costumer Sammy Sheldon (who most recently worked on A Haunting in Venice) had clearly done some research for this film. While the main female characters were all varying levels of “pretty pretty princess” with their beachy waves flying free, there were notable attempts to represent Jewish clothing in 16th-century Venice with a degree of sensitivity not usually seen on film, as well as all the men’s costumes being really rather good.

Later, we see Jessica after she’s converted to Christianity to marry Lorenzo:

So what would a fabulously wealthy Venetian noblewoman such as Portia be wearing in 1596? Probably something along these lines:

And what is Portia wearing in this film?

Portia’s maid, Nerissa, has a more realistic silhouette for the 16th century, just not really the late 16th century:

As far as the men’s costumes go, they’re more on-point with what I’d expect of the late 16th century:

Have you seen The Merchant of Venice (2004)? What are your thoughts about the costumes?