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Hamlet [Blu-ray Book]
Additional Multi-Format options | Edition | Discs | Price | New from | Used from |
Watch Instantly with | Rent | Buy |
Hamlet (1996) | — | — |
Genre | Drama |
Format | Dolby, NTSC, AC-3, Subtitled, Multiple Formats, Blu-ray, DTS Surround Sound, Widescreen |
Contributor | Charlton Heston, Rufus Sewell, Kate Winslet, Jack Lemmon, Kenneth Branagh, Billy Crystal, Gerard Depardieu, Derek Jacobi, Julie Christie, Robin Williams See more |
Language | English |
Runtime | 4 hours and 2 minutes |
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Product Description
"Hamlet has the kind of power, energy and excitement that movies can truly exploit," actor/director Kenneth Branagh says. In this first full-text film of William Shakespeare's play – shot on 65mm film and exhibited in Panavision Super 70, power surges through every scene. The timeless tale of murder, corruption and revenge is reset in a lavish 19th-century world, using sprawling Blenheim Palace as Elsinore and staging much of the action in mirrored, gold-filled interiors. A landmark cast (Julie Christie, Kate Winslet, Billy Crystal, Robin Williams, Charlton Heston and more), the excitement of the Bard's words and an energetic filmmaking style lift the story from its often shadowy ambience to fully-lit pageantry and rage.
Product details
- Is Discontinued By Manufacturer : No
- MPAA rating : PG-13 (Parents Strongly Cautioned)
- Product Dimensions : 6.5 x 5.25 x 0.25 inches; 4 ounces
- Item model number : 883929113682
- Director : Kenneth Branagh
- Media Format : Dolby, NTSC, AC-3, Subtitled, Multiple Formats, Blu-ray, DTS Surround Sound, Widescreen
- Run time : 4 hours and 2 minutes
- Release date : August 17, 2010
- Actors : Kenneth Branagh, Julie Christie, Billy Crystal, Gerard Depardieu, Charlton Heston
- Subtitles: : English, Spanish, French
- Language : English (DTS 5.1)
- Studio : Warner Home Video
- ASIN : B000Q7ZNDG
- Number of discs : 1
- Best Sellers Rank: #100,293 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
- #6,891 in Drama Blu-ray Discs
- Customer Reviews:
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The enunciation of Shakespeare’s complex language in this filmed version is wonderfully paced and comes across crystal clear. Director Branagh’s cinematic flair is on full display and the production design is dazzling to the eye. If some of Branagh’s interpretations aren’t quite in accord with your previous encounters with Hamlet, chalk it up to having your horizons stretched. Worthwhile commentaries on the making of the film accompany the 2-disc dvd set.
And, since this is Shakespeare's best known play, and perhaps the finest play written in any language, the more versions you see the better. I already mentioned one reason, the added depth achieved by camera close ups and long range views, for recommending this version. A second reason is that this production makes a point of adding every word Shakespeare wrote, even to the point of reconciling different editions to get the best lines. Almost all versions of Shakespeare's plays, and especially Hamlet, are cut down, with one or more sup-plots shrunk or deleted. This does not, which is why it runs to over 4 hours. Added to Shakespeare's words are a number of flashbacks and "interpretation" scenes which imagine what meaning is lurking behind some of the words spoken on stage.
The cast is stupendous. It is the kind of cast usually assembled for such epics as "The Longest Day" where most characters may be on the screen for about 5 minutes, so they need a familiar face in order for you to remember who that pilot was after he was shot down (Oh yes, that's Richard Burton. He was in the pub scene 90 minutes ago.) Most of the key roles are played by well known Shakespearian specialists, such as Branagh, Derek Jacobi, and Richard Briers. Several of the minor characters are Shakespearean regulars too, like Brian Blessed as the ghost. I especially liked to see Jacobi in a solid, major role, and not as window dressing in the first episodes of costume dramas, to lend weight to the cast.
There are also lots of good non-Shakespearean actors in the main rank, especially Julie Christie and Kate Winslet. Among the incidental characters, talent is used with such abandon that one is almost inclined to refer to casting pearls before swine, bot so many of them work to perfection. My favorite is Charlton Heston as the leader of the traveling company of players who performs for the court of Denmark. He plays the role to perfection, and he seems perfectly cast. The other extreme is Jack Lemmon as Marcellus, one of the guards who first spots the ghost during the night watch at Elsinore Castle. It is not a comic role, and you have to look twice to recognize him. He only has two or three short scenes.
Speaking of comedy roles (and Shakespeare always manages to include one or two, even in tragedies, there are Billy Crystal as the first gravedigger and Robin Williams as a courtier, who scores the fencing match between Hamlet and Laertes in the last act. Williams seems wasted, but Crystal is pitch perfect.
For the first time, I get the sense that Shakespeare's main interest in this play was not justice or revenge, but madness, as two of the main characters either feign madness or actually become mad. And, dare I say it that it seems the most sane character, Polonius, is belittled by all the other characters, then killed, from madness. But an analysis like that is above my Shakespearean pay grade...
Which makes me think that almost all actors in this production worked for scale (that is, peanuts).
I have seen at least two other productions which are done in bright light, for the camera, and neither can hold a candle to this one. And for all the lights and cinematic expanses, the key speeches come off perfectly.
Highly recommended.
To potential buyers of this DVD:
UPSIDE
1. The dialogue is the complete Hamlet from all editions of the play.
2. Branagh's performance is majestical fire.
3. The set, the costumes, the dialogue - all beautiful.
DOWNSIDE
1. Ironically, a weakness is the classic "To be or not to be" soliloquy. Branagh attempts to emotionally color this moment with eerie background music throughout the soliloquy, but his delivery feels too controlled. It requires a more reflective quality than Branagh imparts: Hamlet has crossed the Rubicon, his unconscious fury erupting into his conscious mind. The mad-playing Hamlet discovers he really has strayed into madness, and under the shocks of what he's faced - murdered father, adulterous mother, vicious uncle, betrayal of all friends (but one, Horatio), confrontation with a ghost - this surely is no surprise. This too is the moment Hamlet realizes he's failed to DARE to believe in the truth of his desire and in so doing mired his soul. This psychologically deep soliloquy can also be seen simply as a cold-blooded and pretty astute assessment of the whole nasty "down side" of life; ie, "Enough's enough". But Branagh doesn't convincingly touch one or the other key. Instead, his "To be" comes off more like a creaky Shakespearean "blue note" - a jazz note played "between the keys".
2. Act I scene 3: Laertes' farewell to his sister Ophelia. This scene fails. The weakness is inexcusable. Michael Maloney (playing Laertes) is a fine actor more than capable of fulfilling the requirements of this scene. Branagh should have focused far far more precisely here because Laertes is a central foil (the other being Fortinbras) to Hamlet. Yet the impression we receive of Laertes here, under Branagh's direction, is of a doofus showing off his foppish erudition to his innocent and impressionable sister via cloying fistfuls of gummy platitudes. Unfortunate. This is our sole opportunity to gauge, know, and respect Laertes before his vengeful return and transformation following his father's death, and Branagh - to my mind - clearly has wasted (one might say violated) this sole opportunity to breathe depth, life, and dramatic force into Laertes. (The fall of a good man with a gifted mind delivers considerably more dramatic impact than the fall of an immature fop.) This wasted opportunity dampens Laertes' dramatic force later in the play and therefore hamstrings the play itself. (If you doubt this and already have the DVD, reexamine this scene and judge for yourself.)
3. Another downside is the "Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio; a fellow of infinite jest" scene. Try to imagine coming across a graveyard then finding yourself holding in your hand the skull of a beloved childhood friend in your hand. "My gorge rises at it." Not Branagh's apparently though. Branagh just doesn't pull this off well. It's more like he came across an old pet's skull. In fact, it doesn't seem to affect him even that much. This scene is in fact, to my mind, the entire hinge of the play. Confronting death face to face. Branagh just can't grab it by the roots.
Downsides aside, this film is a *marvelous* conjunction of our greatest English playwright and (perhaps) our most perceptive modern dramatist in what I consider to be the best version of Hamlet ever produced.
Top reviews from other countries
ar rapport à l'original. Je n'ai toujours pas reçu mon remboursement alors que le colis a été renvoyé le 2 février.
今度は是非、DVDでお目に掛かりたいものです。
Branagh è uno dei pochi a mantenere il subplot dell'invasione norvegese, il che aiuta a dare tutta un'altra interpretazione di Amleto, oltre alla classica tragedia famigliare dove il complesso edipico, sono sincera, mi è sempre parso un po' di troppo, senza nulla togliere alle versioni di signori del cinema come Zeffirelli od Olivier che invece lo hanno abbracciato in pieno.
Adoro l'ambientazione tardo-ottocentesca di Branagh, che strizza l'occhio alle atmosfere di Guerra e Pace o di Anna Karenina.
Di solito non impazzisco terribilmente per i mash up di attori inglesi con attori americani, ma qui non se ne risente assolutamente, anzi. L'accoppiata Jacobi-Christie nei panni di Claudio e Gertrude funziona benissimo (e mi fa sogghignare, ripensando al precedente ruolo di Jacobi come Amleto nel Prince of Denmark), e altrettanto evocativi sono Kate Winslet e lo stesso Kenneth Branagh, nella più bella e carismatica interpretazione di Ofelia e Amleto che abbia mai avuto il piacere di ammirare in un film.
Quattro ore di pellicola possono risultare pesantine di primo acchito, ma il film scorre che è un piacere al punto da non soffrire assolutamente della lunghezza della visione.