i be a shakespeare lover since childhood . i be also a jew . merchant of venice be anti semitic through and through no matter how hard scholar and literature lover try to re interpret it . in the play and shylock be portray a demonic and cold hearted and have no forgiveness and no warmth and no love except for money and cruel revenge and whereas the christian be kind and moral people . his motif in the play revolve around money ( he plot revenge from the start base on damage cause to his business as well a blind racial hate ) and not noble ideal or hurt racial pride a this movie want you to believe . and this characterization be give to him by shakespeare himself and not by the other character . a final proof and the happy end be where the jew lose his money and be force to convert to christianity . i acknowledge this and move on . it be part of history and i enjoy shakepeare despite this fact . therefore i expect a movie base on this play to play it straight . i would much rather see the work adapt for it rich language and storytelling without any whitewashing . but many of the the bard artful subtlety and playful character be lose in this movie . for example and in the last scene where the men discover portia undercover work a a man who also take away their ring and instead of the playful game of word and misunderstanding a the truth reveal itself and it become a mean spirited game where two bitchy woman play cruelly with their soon to be husband . so instead and we be only left with lovely detailed set and fragment of the rich language with poor reinterpretation and poor casting and one intense courtroom scene and and a controversy . the truth be and i think it would be much easy to identify the anti semitism in the story and move on if it be leave a be . despite all the whitewash the maker of this movie pull out of their hat and there be plenty of hatred left and only now people can make excuse and pretend the portrayal of jew isn not so bad anymore . and finally and another problem be with most of the actor be miscast . pacino be way out of his league and be very uncomfortable with the language and not to mention the horribly fake accent . fiennes a bassanio be charmless and awkward with the language . iron be dependable a always but doesn not do much with his role . portia be somewhat ok but unlikeable and and cover in bad makeup and just like the movie .