A Richly Textured Version of the World's Most Famous Drama
There have been a number of film versions of Hamlet, but the best so far is the four-hour one released in 1996 that was directed by Kenneth Branagh and stars him as the title character, Kate Winslet as Ophelia, Derek Jacobi as Claudius and Julie Christie as Gertrude. The key roles of Polonius, Laertes and Horatio are well played by Shakespeare veterans, while many smaller parts are taken by familiar actors, including Robin Williams, Jack Lemmon, Billy Crystal and Charlton Heston. The movie has elaborate and opulent sets, colorful and elegant costumes, location shooting at Blenheim Palace and a good musical score by Patrick Doyle. Branagh not only preserves the majesty of the Bard's language, he makes the story visually appealing.
But for many people the definitive version of Hamlet is the wonderful, moody 1948 film directed by and starring Laurence Olivier, in which an always-melancholy, indecisive Prince mopes around a gloomy, claustrophobic Elsinore. These people may have difficulty accepting Branagh's movie, where an energetic, outraged Hamlet makes up his mind to act and Elsinore consists of many spacious, brightly lit, ornate rooms.
The 1948 film is by far the more subtle and poetic of the two, but Olivier omits much important material in order to focus narrowly on a family tragedy. But the longer 1996 movie is broader in scope, keeping all of Shakespeare's scenes, giving this version greater clarity and resonance. Branagh's rendering ends with the Norwegians seizing control of Denmark, thus impacting the whole of northern Europe.
A Film That Is Pleasing to the Eye
The use of color in Branagh's Hamlet is excellent, and one of the reasons this works so well is that the setting is moved forward to the latter half of the nineteenth century. The change in time frame permits the characters to wear eye-catching clothing and makes it credible that Elsinore Castle might look like Blenheim Palace, a monumental Baroque country mansion about eight miles from Oxford.
The Elsinore Castle interiors were shot on lavish sets at Shepperton Studios and contain many decorative mirrors. We watch Hamlet's reflection in one of them as he recites the "To be or not to be" soliloquy. While delivering his "Get thee to a nunnery" speech, he violently drags Ophelia past a row of mirrored doors.
The story is set in winter, and there are fine scenes involving snow, both real and artificial. In one charming scene, Laertes and Ophelia walk through the castle's snow-covered formal garden on a sunny day. In another, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern ride through the snow on a miniature train.
One of the most striking images in the movie is Ophelia lying dead under the surface of the water, looking beautiful but ghostly. This evokes the famous painting by John Everett Millais that hangs in the Tate.
Honoring Shakespeare's Words
The 1996 film Hamlet is billed as a full-text version, but inquiring minds might wonder what that means. According to the DVD audio commentary by Branagh and Shakespeare scholar Russell Jackson, their approach was to include everything in the First Folio and add to it missing passages found in the Second Quarto. Beyond that, they incorporated material from other early manuscripts and emendations by modern experts. In his video introduction on the DVD, Branagh jokes that what they ended up with has been referred to as the Eternity Version because it goes on forever.
But one of the major strengths of Branagh's full-text version is dramatic coherence. For example, Hamlet says, "The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the King," but many productions reduce that play to a dumb show which is too cryptic to cause Claudius to set up the Prince's murder. But in Branagh's film, the explicitness of that play makes it obvious that if the King is to survive, he cannot risk leaving Hamlet alive. Incidentally, the performances here of Charlton Heston and Rosemary Harris as the Player King and Player Queen are marvelous.
Another strength of the full text is that it enriches the story. For example, in his great film Olivier cut Fortinbras, obscuring the important idea that the tragedy is national in scope. Furthermore, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are missing from Olivier's version, removing the element of their personal betrayal. Also, the audience is robbed of the noirish moment when the English ambassador announces, "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead."
Superb Audio Commentary by Branagh and Shakespeare Scholar
The DVD set provides an outstanding feature-length audio commentary by director/star Kenneth Branagh, and he is ably assisted by Russell Jackson, Professor of Drama and Theatre Arts at the University of Birmingham and editor of The Cambridge Guide to Shakespeare on Film.
Branagh says he wanted to treat Hamlet as an epic and shot it in 65 mm, then printed it on 70 mm film. He decided to avoid the Gothic look with men in doublet and hose, and the inspiration for the costuming and art direction in his movie came from the Austro-Hungarian Empire. He tried hard to preserve language continuity, which dictated some long takes, and he describes some fancy tracking shots. In general, he likes to start shots wide and then go in, which is the opposite of Olivier.
Robin Williams, who plays Osric, is singled out by Branagh as giving "one of the most completely successful performances in the film." Branagh mentions that Williams trained at Juilliard.
Shakespeare buffs will be fascinated by the discussion by Branagh and Jackson of different ways of looking at the story. For example, was Gertrude having an affair with Claudius before the death of old Hamlet? Branagh and Jackson also run down different ways of playing various characters. For instance, Polonius is often played as a naïve buffoon, but here he is a competent, pragmatic, cynical man of the world. Branagh's shorthand for his concept of Polonius is that he is Denmark's prime minister.
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