2 April 2014 Perspectives As far as we know, Shakespeare wrote Macbeth in 1606, making it around 400 years old and in desperate need of a renewal. Although setting an adaptation of the play in modern Melbourne in the middle of a gang war might have seemed comical ten years ago, with corpses piled up from St Kilda to Sunshine in the real gang war of the Victorian town, this now seems 100% plausible. The difficulty, of course, is finding a way to accurately transform the noble lords of Scotland into underworld gangsters while retaining Shakespeare's true intentions. In reality, it's quite simple, it's not possible. Despite Geoffrey Wright's efforts to produce the 21st century adaptation of Shakespeare's Macbeth in 2006, and his attempt to portray the concept of stereotypical gender roles and relationships in a modern context, he only served to to make fun of this powerful tragedy. In contrast, Roman Polanski's The Tragedy of Macbeth, produced in 1971, is today considered one of the most influential cinematic illustrations of the Shakespearean play, while closely following the themes and threads of the original text. Polanski's Macbeth was produced in accordance with the socio-political context of the 1970s. Thus, before embarking on an analysis of the film, it is imperative to first understand the era in which it was released. The turn of the 1960s marked the beginning of a period of immense change and development within society; the era of Man on the Moon, communism and women's liberation. Roman Polanski has intertwined many of these pressing concepts in his production and has specifically chosen to highlight the stereotypical role of women and the appropriate way to behave, through this... ... middle of paper .... ..initial text; the same cannot be said of the modernized versions which have been rebuilt again and again. Instead, they interpreted contradictory attitudes and values, through which Shakespeare's true intentions were lost in translation.BibliographyHubPages Inc. 2014, “The Concept of Femininity in Shakespeare's Macbeth,” http:// barbarahend.hubpages.com/hub/The-Concept -of-Femininity-in-Shakespeares-Macbeth > 30/3/14Macbeth (DVD), 2006, directed by Geoffrey WRIGHT: Martin Fabinyi, Australia. Shmoop University, Inc. 2014, “Macbeth Theme of Fate and Freewill”, http: //www.shmoop.com/macbeth/fate-free-will-theme.html > 3/31/14SparkNotes LLC, 2014, “Analysis of major characters", http://www.sparknotes.com/shakespeare/macbeth/ canalysis.html > 29/3/14The Tragedy of Macbeth, (DVD), 1971, Directed by Roman POLANSKI: Playboy Enterprises, United Kingdom.