Looking for Richard

Looking for Richard (1996) is the documentary you can watch online on iFILM, and it's unlike any Shakespeare film you've seen. Al Pacino directs and leads, wrestling with Richard III to figure out why a four-hundred-year-old play still lands — and why so many Americans flinch at the Bard.

Pacino bounces between rehearsals, the streets of New York and lecture halls. He argues with strangers, picks the text apart line by line, and grills actors and scholars about what it actually means to play a tyrant. On camera: Kevin Spacey, Alec Baldwin, Winona Ryder, Estelle Parsons, with the British old guard weighing in — John Gielgud, Kenneth Branagh, Vanessa Redgrave, Peter Brook.

The result is a rare film about how film gets made, full of self-deprecation and zero pretension. Pacino doesn't lecture you on Shakespeare; he shows his own confusion and his hunger to crack it. If you love watching the craft from backstage, this one's for you. Stream Looking for Richard (1996) online on iFILM.