"Yes. What seems to be the trouble?"
"Yes, well, I'm having trouble sleeping."
"I see. And has anything in your life changed recently, anything unusual happened?"
"Er, well, I did meet these scary women in the woods who said I'd be king."
"Right. Anything else?"
"... My wife did make me murder someone as they slept in their bed."
"I see. Well I think it's quite likely you're suffering from what we call a 'guilty conscience'."
"Oh... Right. Well what can I do about it?"
"Well, not a lot, really. Carry on on your chosen path and see what happens."
Is Shakespeare's play about determinism - there's nothing you can do - what will happen will happen? I don't know, but with the interesting line "Can'st not thy minister to a mind disease?" it seems to me he's anticipating psychotherapy.
Not a big fan of sitting through entire Shakespeare plays - my mind tends to wander off as the language is tricky - despite the fact that he writes brilliant stuff. But I have to say Welles has done a remarkable achievement here on a very low budget, making the play highly visual and memorable. It's enacted on (Republic) studio sets which have a rock-hewn rough-and-ready organicness to them. The main castle set is used imaginatively to cover much of the action, and Welles keeps things in long takes, moving the camera, often from a very low position, as well as blocking the actors in interesting ways. (Fred Ritter is the art director.)
The acting's good: Welles, Jeanette Nolan, Dan O'Herlihy (Macduff), Roddy McDowell, Edgar Barrier, Alan Napier, Erskine Sanford, Peggy Webber etc.
Moodily lit by (Welles and) John Russell, it has an apocalyptic feel to it, somehow, and Welles manages to do a lot with very little (final castle invasion doesn't actually use that many extras, artfully filmed). Good music from Jacques Ibert.
It's a brutal play, never more so than in the abrupt murder of the child.
It is, in fact, really good.
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