In his eagerness to open Shakespeare up to everyone, Branagh has loaded the film with casting surprises. He looks like a bearded Chucky, the murderous doll from "Child's Play." His loudly recorded exhalations suggest the aqualung rasps of Darth Vader and his ghostly apparition is attended by earth-cracking, smoking scenery that suggests a low-budget disaster movie. Brian Blessed's otherwise respectable turn as the ghost of Hamlet's slain father is destroyed by baby-size spotlights on his bright blue eyes. You can be amazed by the pristine cinematography, particularly just before the intermission, when Hamlet vows bloody retribution while the camera pulls back to reveal a snowy landscape behind him full of advancing troops.īut there are many more instances when you want to run screaming from Elsinore Castle. You can be lifted by Derek Jacobi's intelligent interpretation of Claudius, Richard Brier's superbly stuffy Polonius and Julie Christie's subtly exquisite Queen Gertrude. Unfortunately, we're stuck with Branagh's direction - and there's the rub. This story is all action and every speech leads somewhere. We're also reminded that "Hamlet" is not the story of an indecisive, ineffective, chatty, loony prince. Branagh shows us how everything in this play - from Hamlet's play-within-a-play to Ophelia's descent into madness - matters in the ultimate scheme of things. In fact, he has reprised the entire text, drawing from the scholastically approved versions - the First Folio and Second Quarto. The medieval court of Denmark in 19th-century dress. In the recent "Romeo and Juliet," an extended MTV video, and "Richard III," a World War I-era fascist fable, the stylistic affectations tended to eclipse the real fireworks: Shakespeare's poetry.įor his 70mm version of "Hamlet," director Kenneth Branagh may have reclothed In this era of style-over-substance, how a director dabbles with Shakespeare tends to garner more attention than the text itself. : Branagh's 'Hamlet': Not to Beīranagh's 'Hamlet': Not to Be By Desson Howe
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