There's no chemistry between Joseph Fiennes and Gwyneth Paltrow in Shakespeare In Love, but fortunately for director John Madden and scriptwriters Marc Norman and Tom Stoppard, Fiennes creates sufficient electricity to carry this tightly-plotted, highly entertaining movie, along with some help from Judi Dench who plays a sharp-tongued Queen Elizabeth and an able supporting cast.

The plot for the movie stems from the question: What inspired William Shakespeare to write like he did? The answer is a richly passionate Shakespeare, a struggling playwright seemingly destined to remain in the shadow of his contemporary, Christopher Marlowe. At the beginning of the movie, Shakespeare suffers a terrible case of writer's block and seeks aid from a medieval shrink to little avail. And while his new play goes seemingly unappreciated by the rest of the court, he does have one groupie, Viola De Lesseps (Paltrow).

Defying the tradition that all actors be male, she dresses up as a boy to audition for Shakespeare's new play, which goes under the rather unfortunate working title of Romeo And Ethel, The Pirate's Daughter. Eventually William sees through her disguise and the two plunge into a sweet, passionate love affair, providing Shakespeare with his muse. Unfortunately Viola is promised to a royal fop, and the whole play is constantly under siege from all sides; a lack of talent, theatre closings due to the plague or public indecency and attempted murders of playwright (twice). The play does managed to get staged, but the affair between Shakespeare and Viola might not have as good an end.

Mixing low humour with a romantic drama would easily have doomed any other movie, but the capable direction of Madden and the sharp lines of Norman and Stoppard (who fall back on the Bard once in a while), carry it through. There's a lot happening but the story lets every character have their moment, and the cast milk the best out of those precious moments of screen time, while Fiennes stakes his claim as the thinking woman's poster boy with his depiction of a Shakespeare as Casanova. Paltrow, however, leaves one dissatisfied; her performance doesn't grate, but neither does it compel. Nonetheless, it's insufficient to sink this film. William Shakespeare most certainly wasn't the suave lover of the film, but he should agree, this is one depiction that would have him clapping in his grave.

Rating: $$$$$$ 1/2 out of $$$$$$$