there's plenty of opportunities to inject the social commentary the film is so desperately going for, but it's generic and lifeless with cliche characters; "Measure for Measure" is a misguided unmeasurable failure
in terms of craft the film is okay for a bare-bones production; As a version of Shakespeare, this one doesn't really measure up, and as a grim urban melodrama, it's fairly mediocre
Hugo Weaving gives a commanding performance as a local underworld boss known as Duke, but the rest of the cast struggles to measure up, and the central star-crossed romance ..is cheesy and unconvincing
convoluted and ponderously paced, "Measure for Measure" relies too often on sentimental music and narrative shorthand; the script is too cluttered for it to resonate and too mired in a muddle of sin and redemption
a barely recognizable Shakespeare adaptation; Shakespeare scholars have often labeled Measure for Measure a "problem play," a term that has been given multiple meanings; Ireland's tonally ambivalent film fits one of those meanings pretty well