The RSC puts a modern spin on Shakespeare's Hamlet in this filmed-for-television version of their stage production. The Prince of Denmark seeks vengeance after his father is murdered and his mother marries the murderer.
Director:
Gregory Doran
Stars:
David Tennant,
Patrick Stewart,
Penny Downie
When the brilliant but unorthodox scientist Victor Frankenstein rejects the artificial man that he has created, the Creature escapes and later swears revenge.
Director:
Kenneth Branagh
Stars:
Robert De Niro,
Kenneth Branagh,
Helena Bonham Carter
Out of work actor Joe volunteers to help try and save his sister's local church for the community by putting on a Christmas production of Hamlet, somewhat against the advice of his agent ... See full summary »
Director:
Kenneth Branagh
Stars:
Michael Maloney,
Richard Briers,
Hetta Charnley
An update of the classic Shakespeare story, director Kenneth Branagh shot this movie like a classic 30s musical. The film tells the story of four best friends who swear off love.
Six former college friends, with two new friends, gather for a New Years Eve weekend reunion at a large English countryside manor after ten years to reminisce about the good times now long gone.
Hamlet, son of the king of Denmark, is summoned home for his father's funeral and his mother's wedding to his uncle. In a supernatural episode, he discovers that his uncle, whom he hates anyway, murdered his father. In an incredibly convoluted plot--the most complicated and most interesting in all literature--he manages to (impossible to put this in exact order) feign (or perhaps not to feign) madness, murder the "prime minister," love and then unlove an innocent whom he drives to madness, plot and then unplot against the uncle, direct a play within a play, successfully conspire against the lives of two well-meaning friends, and finally take his revenge on the uncle, but only at the cost of almost every life on stage, including his own and his mother's. Written by
John Brosseau <brossj5683@aol.com>
seen one you've seen them all, right? wrong! I still like the sombre Olivier version and Gibson did well, but this is in a class of its own.
I finally realized with this expanded production set 200 years closer to the present the full message that Shakespeare cleverly concealed with the more prominent aspect of Hamlet's quandary, and that is he, Hamlet, is driven to distraction by the awareness its the insidiousness of human nature that created the conditions that saw his father murdered.
looking at the play with this insight you can see numerous scenes where this notion is there in the background. and by changing the era, Branagh shows yet again the astonishing applicability of that truth. all you need is to read a newspaper, something 'included' in this production.
thank god for British stage actors raised on Shakespeare.
a very rewarding viewing.
16 of 21 people found this review helpful.
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seen one you've seen them all, right? wrong! I still like the sombre Olivier version and Gibson did well, but this is in a class of its own.
I finally realized with this expanded production set 200 years closer to the present the full message that Shakespeare cleverly concealed with the more prominent aspect of Hamlet's quandary, and that is he, Hamlet, is driven to distraction by the awareness its the insidiousness of human nature that created the conditions that saw his father murdered.
looking at the play with this insight you can see numerous scenes where this notion is there in the background. and by changing the era, Branagh shows yet again the astonishing applicability of that truth. all you need is to read a newspaper, something 'included' in this production.
thank god for British stage actors raised on Shakespeare.
a very rewarding viewing.