The opening scene with the cold winter background, leave less grounds and the grey skies that was alluded to above, is a direct connection to the opening soliloquy exerted by Richard in Shakespeare’s Richard III, "Now is the winter of our discontent made glorious summer by this son of York...". In the same scene Pacino also juxtaposes modern buildings with classic castles, and Shakespearean literature (The Tempest), with the wintery background, successfully achieving to render a connection between Shakespeare and Looking for Richard.
Witt? Yes,
Pacino? Yes,
Fail? Maybe so,
Success? I don’t know.
The same confusion is attained by the seemingly unorthodox construction of the scenes. The postmodern structure, in exclusion of the chronological storyline, is brilliant in its construction, linking scenes from the Richard III film by association to video footage outside the story. Intertextualising makes the story of Richard III much more accessible to its audiences who are now in cinema’s and not in theatres. This juxtaposition is brilliantly achieved in one scene, where Al Pacino’s flat cap is transformed to a crown as the scene translates from Al Pacino in America to Richard in England making a direct correlation with Richard III play.
Intertextualising, is also used as to propagate a message, such as at the occurrence of King Edwards death, where scenes of Edwards death dramatised by orchestral music, the weeping of Elizabeth and her deeply dispirited face, is juxtaposed with a group of people chatting over tea. This blot of humor is a means of