If there’s one guy you can count on to have consistently good screenplays, it’s good ol’ Bill Shakespeare. Most of the recent remakes of Shakespeare stories have been more obviously teen-appealing stories like Romeo & Juliet or The Taming of the Shrew, but O tackles one of Shakespeare’s darkest tragedies, Othello. The original play is about a Moor general in the Venetian military who is married to the daughter of an important senator. A jealous man named Iago schemes and lies to almost everyone and leads Othello to believe that his wife is cheating on him, causing Othello to kill her in a fit of rage and then himself. Of course, several other people die along the way (this is a tragedy) and it is not the kind of story you go to for a good mood. In this modern day remake, Othello is a black, star basketball player for an all-white school who is dating the principle’s daughter. Our Iago is a jealous teammate who wants the girl for himself and can’t stand seeing a black kid becoming more popular than him. The acting is first rate in this film and I like the adaptation to a modern day setting. Josh Hartnett and Julia Stiles have never been better than they are in this film and the intense emotion required by the story makes their performances all the more impressive. The application to teen life in America is startlingly true; anyone who has been to high school in the last twenty years knows that lies and jealousy can be dangerous in high school, even fatal. If you think you have seen good teen drama, just wait until you see O.