--- title: "King Lear" year: 2008 kind: "film" canonical: "https://film.one/film/king-lear" fi1m_id: "king-lear" imdb_id: "tt2049483" tmdb_id: 38413 fi1m_score: 78 critics_reviews: 1 published: "2026-10-05T00:56:23.281083+00:00" updated: "2026-10-05T00:56:31.252290+00:00" region: "TR" licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL." --- # King Lear (2008) Directed by Trevor Nunn · 2h 30m · Drama, TV Movie ## Identity King Lear - **Canonical:** https://film.one/film/king-lear - **Type:** Film - **Fi1m ID:** king-lear - **IMDb ID:** tt2049483 - **TMDB ID:** 38413 - **Same entity:** https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2049483/, https://www.themoviedb.org/movie/38413 **Fi1m score: 78** · Critics: 1 of 6 reviews so far *In a sentence:* The king gives away his kingdom and keeps every close-up > Trevor Nunn’s television *King Lear* is a filmed stage production in all but name: dark, close and plainly spoken. The camera adds little. Ian McKellen adds a great deal, and so do Frances Barber and Monica Dolan as the daughters who get tired of him. ## Synopsis King Lear (Ian McKellen), old and tired of ruling, calls his court together to divide his kingdom among his three daughters according to how much each says she loves him. Goneril (Frances Barber) and Regan (Monica Dolan) make their speeches. Cordelia (Romola Garai), the youngest and his favourite, refuses to perform, and Lear disinherits her on the spot, banishing the Earl of Kent (Jonathan Hyde) for objecting. The Duke of Burgundy (Peter Hinton) withdraws his suit now that she comes with nothing. Meanwhile the Earl of Gloucester (William Gaunt) is being worked on by his illegitimate son Edmund (Philip Winchester), who forges a letter to turn him against the legitimate heir, Edgar (Ben Meyjes). Lear, with his hundred knights and his Fool (Sylvester McCoy), goes to stay with Goneril, and the welcome is not what he expected. ## Review Trevor Nunn’s *King Lear* is Shakespeare’s play made for television in 2008, running 150 minutes, with Ian McKellen as the king. It opens on a court got up in dress uniform, braid and epaulettes and polished boots, and an old man who has decided to retire and wants to be thanked for it. The question with any filmed Lear is whether the camera gives you something the stalls would not. Here the answer is mostly no, and the reason to watch is McKellen, who would be worth watching in a car park. He starts the play vain and pleased with himself, a man who has staged the love test as a treat and expects to enjoy it. The pleasure drains out of his face in the time it takes Cordelia to say her one word. From there he plays the decline not as a slide but as a series of drops, each one landing a little harder. Frances Barber’s Goneril is not a villain but a daughter who has been waiting a very long time for her father to stop. Monica Dolan’s Regan is the nervous younger sister who discovers, to her own surprise, that she likes being cruel. Romola Garai’s Cordelia has less to work with and plays her stiff, which is defensible, since the part is mostly about refusing. The scene that got us is the one where the two elder daughters strip Lear of his knights, haggling him down from a hundred to fifty to none. We were moved more than we expected, and it was not the speech. It was the moment before it, when McKellen looks from Barber to Dolan and back, does the arithmetic, and his mouth goes slack. He has understood that he is nobody’s father now. Then the words come, and they come as if he were finding them for the first time. Paul Wheeler’s photography is television photography: close, dark, a face in a pool of light against black. It serves the actors well and the kingdom badly. There is no horizon anywhere, so when Lear is turned out into the storm the heath is a wind machine, a rain rig and McKellen’s head, and the madness has nowhere to go but inward. McKellen makes that work, roaring at weather we cannot see, but it is his doing and not Wheeler’s. Steve Edis’s music is brass and drum for the court, low strings for the heath, and too often it tells us a scene is sad a bar or two before the actor has had the chance. The men around the king are a mixed bag. Sylvester McCoy’s Fool is a music-hall act, cap and patter and a turn with a pair of spoons, and we warmed to him once we stopped waiting for him to be sad. William Gaunt’s Gloucester is the best of them: bluff, decent, slow on the uptake, a man you would trust with your house and not with a letter. Jonathan Hyde’s Kent is sturdy and clear. Philip Winchester’s Edmund has the smile and the shoulders but delivers his soliloquies to the lens as if pitching us something, and Ben Meyjes’s Edgar is sound without ever being alarming. At 150 minutes it feels every one. The second half, which we will not describe, slows badly in the stretch where the play moves towards the coast, and the television frame, which flatters a face, shrinks a battle to a few men and a flag. Nunn knows where to put the camera for a speech and is less sure where to put it for a crowd. Against other filmed Lears this one is for people who want the words spoken plainly and the lead seen close, and on those terms it delivers. Most critics so far like it a shade less than we do, and on the production they are right. Watch it at home, where it was made to be watched, in one sitting, with the subtitles off. The verse is so clearly spoken you will not need them, which is the thing this version does best after McKellen. *Fi1m score 78, published 5 October 2026.* ## Straight answers **Is King Lear worth watching?** *King Lear* (2008) is worth watching for anyone who wants Shakespeare's words spoken plainly and Ian McKellen seen close, and we scored it 78. The camera adds little, the heath is a wind machine and a face, and the second half slows badly. McKellen, Frances Barber and Monica Dolan carry it regardless. **How long is King Lear, and what is it rated?** *King Lear* runs 2h 30m. It is a drama and tv movie film. **Where can I watch King Lear in Türkiye?** *King Lear* is not on any streaming or rental service in Türkiye at the moment. It is available in 1 other country; change your country at the top of the page to see where. Availability is checked daily. **How does King Lear compare to Ran?** *King Lear* (2008) is a filmed stage production in all but name, while [*Ran*](https://film.one/film/ran) moves the story to feudal Japan and gives it the horizon and the armies this one lacks. Kurosawa's is the better film and the more frightening one. Nunn's is for people who want the verse itself and McKellen's face in close-up. **What should I watch after King Lear?** After *King Lear*, try [*Ran*](https://film.one/film/ran) (1985, Fi1m 92): Kurosawa moves Lear to feudal Japan and gives it the horizon this one lacks. Then [*Chimes at Midnight*](https://film.one/film/chimes-at-midnight) (1965, Fi1m 88): Orson Welles as Falstaff, another old man who talks too much and loses everything. ### Reviews we read (1) - **Los Angeles Times** (75/100, inferred): The critic considers the production worth watching and ultimately moving. They praise its accessibility and the way it brings Shakespeare’s monumental play to television. [Read](https://www.latimes.com/archives/blogs/show-tracker/story/2009-03-24/review-king-lear-on-pbs-great-performances) ## Details - **Director:** Trevor Nunn - **Director:** Trevor Nunn - **Cinematography:** Paul Wheeler - **Music:** Steve Edis - **Cast:** Ian McKellen as King Lear; Romola Garai as Cordelia; Monica Dolan as Regan; Sylvester McCoy as The Fool; Philip Winchester as Edmund; Peter Hinton as Duke of Burgundy; Jonathan Hyde as Earl of Kent; Frances Barber as Goneril - **Runtime:** 2h 30m - **First release (the UK):** 6 August 2008 - **Genres:** Drama, TV Movie ## Where to watch in Türkiye Not streaming, renting or buying in Türkiye at the last check. Also available in: US. Add `?region=XX` to this URL for another country. ## If you liked this - *Ran* (1985), Fi1m 92: Kurosawa moves Lear to feudal Japan and gives it the horizon this one lacks — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/ran.md) - *King Lear* (1971): Peter Brook’s version, shot in winter mud with Paul Scofield, cold and uncompromising - *Korol Lir* (1971): Grigori Kozintsev’s Soviet Lear, with Shostakovich’s music and a real peasant crowd - *Chimes at Midnight* (1965), Fi1m 88: Orson Welles as Falstaff, another old man who talks too much and loses everything — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/chimes-at-midnight.md) - *Richard III* (1995): McKellen’s other filmed Shakespeare, set in a fascist 1930s Britain and much faster --- © Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/film/king-lear